Finding a Way
by Hohenheim the Light Bender
Summary: Katara has to go to an earthkingdom town to get some medicine for her friends, but due to some money trouble she ends up stealing it. Running from justice she is saved by a mysterious outlaw. ZxK Ch 11 is here and Im back!
1. Friend or Foe

_**Finding a Way**_

_This is my first fic made so I hope that it came out right but any who on to the official stuff that when said will keep my ass law suit free!_

**Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA. I repeat, I do not own ATLA. There 'nuff said so on with the show.**

**Ch 1: Friend or Foe**

Aang and his friends, after a lot of flying on Appa's back, decided to land for a while in the middle of a forest in order to stretch their legs and camp for the rest of the day to regain their strengths. The place they selected was perfect, since the dense trees would provide camouflage both for them and Appa from Azula's hunting party, and any other fire nation bounty hunters that they might meet.

Finished with setting up their camp, they decided to start up on their usual chores.

"I'm gonna look for some food around here...meanwhile, why don't you look for some water and more firewood, Katara?" Sokka said.

Katara nodded at her brother, while Aang replied, "Ok, while you guys do that, Toph and me are going to go practice more Earthbending." And with that, the two went off running deeper into the woods in search of an appropriate training ground.

With the group split up, as Katara walked towards the river she had spotted while riding Appa, she reflected again on an idea that crossed her mind months before. She wasn't sure if she were the only one that really noticed in their group, but now she was certain: Toph and Aang were spending _quite_ a lot of time together.

At first she didn't really mind, because she knew that Earthbending would probably be the hardest element for Aang to master, being his natural opposite. Of course, stubborn Aang would inevitably keep trying to master it, no matter how long it would take…but then, Katara had noticed changes that started to happen between the two when they weren't training.

Toph, for some reason, started being nicer to Aang, mostly by not calling him "twinkle toes" anymore. More still, she stopped bossing him around almost completely, although she kept close her sarcastic sense of humor, so Katara really didn't think much of it then neither.

It only started to eat at her when Aang began spending less and less time Waterbending, in order to spend more time around Toph. She wasn't very happy with the idea that Aang was ignoring his Waterbending training, but what really upset her was what his and Toph's behavior really meant.

"Oh, great!" she exclaimed angrily, because after losing herself in her thoughts, she realized that she had accidentally waded deep into the shallow river from which she was supposed to collect water. While she was a Waterbender, and removing the wet from her clothes only took a matter of seconds to complete, it did upset her because she usually wasn't that clumsy.

Shaking her head and remembering what she had come for, she took a deep breath and closed her eyes in order to summon complete concentration. Then gracefully, she began to wave her arms around, and, like poetry in motion, the water from the river followed the rhythm of her arms and hands and smoothly entered the waiting canteens. Feeling more relaxed now that her mind was clear, she slung the canteens over her shoulder and went in search of some firewood for that night's campfire.

As she wandered through the forest, she began to hear strange noises that seemed to come from behind a near hill. Curiosity winning over common sense, she climbed the hill to find out what was going on. She crept up the hill slowly and deliberately, so that no one would perceive her presence. Closing in on the top of the hill, the sounds became clearer.

Two voices stood out. "Come on, _twinkle toes_, is that the best you got, or are you just gonna' stand there evading me all day?" It was Toph's voice.

Seeing them actually training, Katara gave a small sigh of relief as her suspicions were debunked.

Indeed, Aang was only dodging Toph's flying boulder attacks using his Airbending skills to glide from one place to another, finally ending up cornered with his back facing a hill. Seeing as he had no were else to go he breathed deep and placed himself in the horse-stance Toph had showed him.

Aang started to move slowly forward, stomping his feet with great force and with his hands breaking the boulders which came his way, causing the earth around them to tremor. Each step he took forward shook the earth with a growing force, a maneuver which was actually breaking Toph's balance. It was then Aang saw his chance: he aimed and, with the final stomp, sent a direct blow to Toph's foot, making her step back and fall.

Gleeful at Aang's victory, Katara grinned. Aang was progressing and getting closer to dominating the four elements so that he could face the Fire Lord, even beating Toph, whose pride, Katara knew, must surely have been injured. Finally, concrete proof: that never would have happened if they had had a relationship.

Aang then raced to go help Toph up, who had been badly shaken from the blow that finished her, though it bruised her ego more than anything else.

"I don't answer to the name _twinkle toes,_" Aang said, extending a hand to help her up.

Hesitantly brushing her hand against his, she abruptly withdrew and paused, looking away, but then firmly grasped his hand as she smirked, "Now you sound much more like a real Earthbender." Suddenly pulling him down to the ground and flipping so that she was pinning Aang, her face got closer and closer to his, finally closing the distance with a soft kiss. Aang, rendered 'helpless,' kissed back with matching passion.

Katara, wide-eyed and totally stunned, slid down the hill just enough so that she would remain hidden for certain. She couldn't believe that her suspicions were true: Aang had fallen in love with Toph.

This seemed ridiculous to her. "First they hated each other, and now they're making out in the middle of a forest! I mean, they're not even of compatible elements!"

While she was staggered as her discovery, she was more overwhelmed with happiness: Katara was happy that Aang finally had someone. She smiled as she realized it had been ages since she had seen either one as content as they were just moments ago. Toph wasn't nearly as mean or sarcastic as she used to be, and Aang seemed to forget all of his troubles just being around her. She realized that she and Aang made better siblings than lovers. In fact, she thought of him as a brother more than anything—well, most of the time.

Sliding completely down the hill and making her way to the camp, Katara hummed cheerfully, hoping that she would be the first to break the news to her brother that the youngest member in their family was growing up.

Aang and Toph doused her hopes of revealing their secret tryst, however, returning to the campsite even before she did, and long before Sokka.

Katara asked with a wry smile, "So, Aang, did you have fun Earthbending?"

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," he responded with an innocent face, smiling at Toph, who was making earth angels as she waited for the food to arrive. "Has anyone seen Sokka? It's not like him to take this long."

"I hope he's taking so much time getting here because he found himself a big haul…if not, I'm going to squeeze his pony-tailed head with two boulders!"

Finally from the distance came Sokka crying, "Yo, look at what I brought! There's enough berries here to last us for as long as Aang was hibernating!" True to his boast, he had returned with overflowing baskets of berries, which was split amongst the gang. Appa, of course, scored the most.

Holding up a green berry and eying it crtically, Katara asked, "Sokka, are you sure that these berries are good to eat, they look kinda funny to me."

But it was too late. Everybody was gulping the berries down in crazy food frenzy. Aang had shoved more than half of his portion down his throat; Toph was coming in second; and Sokka, determined not to be bested in a contest of gluttony, came in not too far behind in third.

"Come on, Katara," Aang coaxed between gulps, "They're really sweet!"

But of course, Katara was right in questioning the berries, because as soon she was about to try one, Aang, Toph, Sokka and even Appa were beginning to bellow in pain from a severe bout of intoxication.

"Aang, guys, what's wrong?" Katara yelled in horror to see her friends, which were fine just a couple of seconds ago, contract and roll into balls with strong stomach pains, each quickly developing a fever.

She quickly reacted, pulling out blankets from Appa's back and tucking everyone in them as carefully a she could. Next, she got some old rags that she had for bandages and placed them on everybody's forehead, followed by using her bending to soak the bandages in water so that the fevers would be controlled.

Sokka groaned as he tried to suppress his stomach pains to no avail. "Katara, please, you got to go get some medicine for us. Near here, about…four miles west, there's an Earth Kingdom town…there should be medicine there, please you gotta hurry, I don't think this fever is going to go down any time soon."

Katara nodded in affirmation to her brother, picking up her Waterbending canteen and, taking the money they had left, she ran to the town. "Please guys, wait for me, I'll be back as fast as I can, and you guys will be better in no time," she chanted to herself as she ran and got farther and farther away from the camp site.

It had already gotten dark, but after running for fifteen minutes non-stop, she could see some disfigured shapes in the distance: it was the town her brother mentioned to her. She picked up the pace and sprinted through the entrance of the town, asking her way to the closest healer booth.

When she finally got there, almost out of breathe she panted to the keeper of the booth, "Sir…my friends ate some wild berries and got really sick and started to have high fevers that haven't come down, please, I need some medicine for them."

The shopkeeper looked at her for a while, surprised in the hysteric state the young girl was in, but he answered her calmly: "I'll look for something for you in the back." She smiled, thinking that everything was going to be ok. She would just grab the medicine and soon be back to help her friends.

"Here you go, miss," the shopkeeper replied, handing to her a bag with a bottle inside that was full of green powder. "All you have to do is just mix a small amount of this powder in some water for your friends and they'll be good as new".

Relieved, she asked, "How much do I owe you?"

"That'll be fifty gold coins, kind miss."

"Fifty gold coins? That's a lot for just some medicine!" she answered back angrily, knowing that she was being ripped off.

"I understand why you are upset miss, but this town is one of the main town that produces most of the supplies for the Earth Kingdom army, and they need all the supplies they can get, so medicine and other goods hear have a higher price since there isn't a high supply of these things."

"But I need that medicine for my friends, they're in a lot of pain!" she pleaded, but to no avail. She turned around angrily and started to walk off she decided that if the shop keeper wasn't going to give it to her nicely, she would have to take the medicine by force, and so she went to a local shop to get something to eat and wait for night to fall so that she could put her plan into action.

"Aang, hold on I'll be there as soon as I can!" she affirmed herself. But as she as she was eating her meal, her worst fear was happening at that very moment.

Foot steps were heard getting nearer and nearer to the camp site, Aang being the only one awake at the time, sweaty and dehydrated from the fever weakly spoke out, "Katara, is that you?" But as the steps got closer Aang could distinguish that there were actually more than just one person coming up to them. He started to worry, imagining the worst since he couldn't do anything to protect his friends. Unfortunately, his speculation was right.

"Well, well, how the mighty have fallen!" It was Azula; she had finally caught up with them, even though they were well hidden in the dense woods. "Take the prisoners away, we have finally completed our mission, and we are going home!" Aang and the rest struggled to no avail as they were each carried away by Azula's men to their doom.

Meanwhile, inside a local tavern, two of our favorite outlaws had a dinner of their own. A waiter passed by their table, placing on it two hot plates of lobster, followed by two glasses of red wine to drink. "Dig in Zuko, the lobster's so warm and tasty right now it's almost heartbreaking," said the former _Dragon of the West_ in a jolly tone.

"Uncle, are you crazy? Our supplies are nil and we're almost completely broke, how the Hell do you think we're going to pay for all of this."

"Ah, my dear nephew, why do you worry yourself which such burdens, and not just sit back and have some of this delicious wine with me? Besides, our money troubles are all covered if that is what concerns you…here, look at what I found today." Iroh handed his nephew a flier that read:

THREE-DAY PAI SHO TOURNAMENT.

ALL ARE WELCOME!

FIRST PRIZE WILL BE TWO THOUSAND GOLD PIECES!

"See, with this we can't go wrong, my dear nephew."

Zuko sighed and apathetically questioned his Uncle. "It has never occurred to you that we can lose, now have you?"

Iroh smiled, patting his belly rubbing it all around, answering him, "Pai Sho is won by those with the most weight of experience, and with this little red, bottled friend of ours I'll be putting on more experience than our ostrich-horse can carry!"

"Well, if that's what you think, then play your little game, but if you don't win, at least let me know so that we can run out of this town before the people decide to lynch us!"

And with that he got up and started to walk out and leave the tavern. "Zuko, where are you going? You're lobster is getting cold!"

"I'm going to go take _real _action and ensure our financial future! In the meantime, you can have my lobster, you're probably going to need all the experience you can get!" Zuko lifted the cloth door of the tavern and left, vanishing into the night.

His uncle frowned knowing what Zuko meant by _ensuring their financial future,_ for he already saw how he did it many times, and each time, he disapproved of his nephew's dishonorable actions. Although most of the time those actions were the reason they got by in life as fugitives, they were nonetheless dishonorable. Finally he turned back to table where he was eating, happily muttering to himself, "Oh well, more for me then!"

Two hours had passed and it seemed as though the town itself had gone to sleep. All the lights of the booths were being put out and the doors were being locked up and soon, everything was quiet. Neither moon nor star shone in the cloud-covered sky, which had been a weapon that Katara was counting on, as her bending would be far more powerful under the moon. Still, she had her mission, and couldn't let the fear of getting caught or the trouble she might get into get the best of her.

She silently moved from corner to corner, moving closer to her target. "Hold on guys, I'll be there soon," she thought. Finally, she arrived to the booth of the mean greedy shopkeeper she met earlier that day. She snuck up to the window and stared inside the shop trying to locate her target, and simple enough, there it was. The bottle was right on top a table in the center of the shop, where curiously enough was the shopkeeper, sleeping in a chair beside two younger males inside which she supposed to be his sons. All three of them were armed with Earth Kingdom hammers which were usually used by Earthbending soldiers.

She knew that if she woke them up as she stole the medicine, she would surely end up dead if not seriously hurt by their boulder attacks, so she had to work quick and stealthily.

Waving her arms, she steadily bended the water out of her canteen and made it take the shape of a long tentacle with a thin pin-like end that she steadily used to pick the lock on the window. "Come on you stupid lock!" she whispered. "Click, damn you!" Finally, she heard the _click_ sound she desperately wanted to hear. "Yes!" she thought.

Now all she had to do was carefully, steadily, raise the window up without making a single sound. Small beads of sweat formed on her forehead as she put all of her concentration into this maneuver. But soon enough, her efforts paid off, and the window fully opened with not a single stir from the shopkeeper or his sons.

Now came the easy part. She just had to bend her water into a long tentacle and reach out for the bottle. She did this again with the same concentration as she did before. Slowly, the tentacle went in to reach for the bottle, dodging the furniture that was in its way, until finally the tentacle was only three inches away from grasping the bottle, but then a stirring sound was heard as the shopkeeper flipped around in his chair and saw the tentacle facing towards him grabbing the bottle.

She was busted. "Damn it!" she gritted from her teeth; she jerked the tentacle into grabbing the bottle and, with no time to lose, started to run for her life. "Lee, Cho, wake up! We've been robbed!" The two boys jumped right out of their sleep and started to run out the door with their father, hot on Katara's trail.

"Get back here you little thief!" they yelled at her as the two brothers stopped and began to bend, stomping on the ground and sending powerful waves towards Katara's feet, knocking her down. She quickly got herself up and faced back at the three benders, but as she did, the shopkeeper stomped on the ground to lift a boulder to the air and, with his hammer, he smashed the boulder into small shards which shot at Katara at lightning speed, piercing her canteen of bending water and hitting her on the shoulders. Now unable to lift her arms, she started to run again despite the sharp pain she felt, trying to escape from the Earthbenders.

As she ran she was panting, trying to catch her breathe, but all she was thinking about was getting back to the camp as quick as possible. That the wounds that she had gotten on her arms were nothing: as soon as she returned to camp and had access to water, she could heal herself.

But behind her, the three benders took their stances and did a simultaneous stomp, sending a big wave of earth, moving it like a wave towards Katara, hitting her from behind and thrusting her against a wall.

This was it: she was trapped. She tried to get up, but the blow sprained her ankle, rendering her completely helpless on the ground. Moaning, she turned around to see her attackers. She knew that there was no escape. She was outnumbered, she was disabled from her arms being unable to bend water, she had no defense, and worst of all: No one was coming to save her.

She tried scooting herself with the power of her only good leg, pushing back towards the wall as she tried to get as far away from the benders as possible. Never having stolen anything before, she had no idea as to what to expect. Would they finish her off there, or would they send her to jail? But most of all she felt disappointed in herself because she was going to let her friends down. She clutched the bottle hard believing that if she held it tight enough they would never pry it from her grip.

"What do we do now father, how shall we punish this thief?" asked Cho, the youngest brother.

"Do we bury her alive?" asked the older brother impatiently.

"No," said their father. "We will teach this thief a lesson that will follow her till then end of her days! An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. She used her bending to rob from us, and so we will rob her of her bending so that she can never do it again!"

The two siblings understood what their father meant, and with their father lifted their hammers to the sky. The ground began to shake as two giant boulders game out from the ground and hovered over their heads. They were planning to crush her hands so that she would never be able to bend again.

As the boulders hovered, closing in on her all she could think of was her friends, and how they were paying with their lives for her failure. A crystal tear slowly ran down her cheek as she whispered "Aang, Sokka, Toph, I'm so sorry."

The boulders were suspended in the air, the two sons waiting for their father's signal. Their father had his arm raised like when they're about to start a race. Katara with her big blue eyes observed the shop keepers arm, and suddenly it seemed as though time was slowing down. She could see the arm slowly falling down to signal the attack and then time took back its normal speed.

The arm went all the way down and the two brothers launched their boulder straight for Katara's arms.

She flinched and shut her eyes, when suddenly a shadow shot down knocking one boulder out of the way; breaking it against a wall and the other was cut by two dual broad swords causing a cloud of dust to rise.

She opened her eyes, wondering why she wasn't experiencing the worst pain of her life. As she stared, she strained her eyes trying to see just who was it that saved her life.

"Hey, what the Hell is the big idea!" yelled the shopkeeper. His sons too were furious at how this mysterious person had interrupted them from taking their justice, if you can call it justice to disable a helpless girl completely for life. The dust slowly cleared to reveal a mysterious figure dressed in black, the dust still lingering in the air barely covering the figure's face.

Katara looked at him from his back and sighed with relief, knowing that she was safe. She looked down to her right hand, which was still holding the precious bottle.

"I don't know who the hell you think you are, but we were trying to discipline this little thief and you have no right to just barge in like that!" yelled Lee. But as soon as he was done, the shadow had already made his move by charging to him and with the handle of his sword, knocked him in the stomach hurling him at least fifteen feet away. The sky was still cloudy, and the light of the moon was still completely blocked, leaving the two remaining benders still wondering who the shadow was since the environment was almost completely black like the clothes the shadow wore.

"Lee, are you ok?", asked Cho in a concerned voice. "I won't let you get away with that!" he yelled and started to bend boulders of earth all around him, hurling each one to the shadow. The figure at first began to dodge the relatively slow boulders, but realized that they were also getting very close to injuring Katara, so he pulled out his dual swords again, and with them, began to slice in half all of the boulders that were launched to him.

When the bender was done, the shadow, now hidden by the dust from the broken boulders crumbling on the ground, again charged at him, this time jumping into the air and hitting Cho on the head, making him fall to the ground unconscious.

Katara, with her eyes and mouth wide open in awe, observed how the figure took out the benders one by one. She began to admire his agility, grace and ferocity as he dodged and hit each bender with a mighty blow. This style was probably the most refined form of combat the she had ever seen in a warrior—much better than the savage, mindless direct attacks that her brother would usually use. Her savior was indeed a skilled, courageous fighter.

The shopkeeper, being the only bender left standing, squinted his eyes trying to discern the identity of the mysterious warrior. And at last a gust of wind began to blow through the town, quickly dispatching the clouds that blocked the sky, letting moonlight shine down on his shadowy foe.

As the clouds dissipated, the image of the shadow was finally brought into focus. It was a man dressed in black…but a blue Chinese lion mask protected his face. The shopkeeper began to stutter, "You… you're… you're… you're the Blue Spirit!"

"Cho, Lee, get up it's the Blue Spirit! Run before he destroys us all!" And with that the shopkeeper and his two sons fled from the battleground. Katara did not understand. What was so special about the _Blue Spirit_ and why did they fear him so much? She had honestly never heard of him her entire life, and plus he didn't look like a spirit, anyway.

That's when the Spirit turned over to look at her. She contemplated his mask, which was probably the only scary thing about him as she looked at him. He began to walk towards her, but this time, though she did not feel fear, nor did she feel safe. At that moment she felt only confusion. He slowly walked up to her and knelt down, starting to examine her wounds. Turning his back to her while he still on the ground, the Blue Spirit signaled to her to get on his back, which she did.

With Katara settled on his back, the Spirit rose and walked away from the scene. As she laid on his back the pain of her wounds were felt less as she then began to feel the warmth emanating from his back. Even though it was probably the coldest night she had experienced in her adventures with Aang in the woods, his back felt as warm as a hot spring. This comforted her in a way, she was still alive and still had a chance to go save her friends, or so she thought, as they both moved on into the streets, under the light of the moon.

**I know that my summary says Zutara in it and I know that I digressed into Taang instead in the beginning, but I promise that I'll bring up some more real Zutara in the next one. **

**All reviews are strongly encouraged!**


	2. Brother

_About this chapter I just have to inform you guys that sometimes I'll be doing some scene switching unannounced so try to bear with me if you get lost. _

_This chapter is more about Zuko's version of the day of what happened between how he left his uncle in the tavern and when he saves Katara. Memory scenes are written and will be written always in italics._

**Ch 2: Brother**

As Zuko stepped out of the tavern, he made his way through the town, heading to the abandoned room that he and his uncle had found earlier that day in an abandoned shack. Alert, he walked steadily and deliberately, trying to avoid any unnecessary conflicts with the drunks or the suspicious looking travelers that went by, so that if "she" were there, it would be more difficult to spot him in the middle of the night.

The shack that he and his uncle had discovered was located about a five-minute walk from the tavern. The two outlaws were hidden perfectly in plain sight: the area around the shack was totally deserted, and not too many shops were placed around it because the shopkeepers felt it scared away customers. When he entered the shack, the first thing he made sure to do was to place all the locks on the door and pull down all the dusty drapes. Five miniature balls of fire erupted from the tips of his fingers, directing the light towards the center of the room.

The shack was only made up of one room, excluding the bathroom, which contained a simple bed next to dusty window and a rotten table in the middle. He walked towards the bed where he found both his uncle's and his own bag lying. Pulling his sleeve back, he began to dig in high gear through the contents of the bag. After a few seconds, he abruptly stopped, hand still inside the bag. Zuko slowly pulled out what he had been searching for: the Blue Spirit mask. He remembered getting that mask from his first fire festival, when his late cousin Lu Ten gave it to him.

_An eight-year-old Zuko fretted, the combination of anxiety and excitement making his stomach queasy. It was the day of the fire festival, and he was very nervous because it was his very first one and, to make it more special, his cousin Lu Ten was going to take him. Zuko smiled as he thought of Lu Ten: he always had fun with him, and he thought of him as his older brother. The brother that he always wished he had, instead of the demonic little blood-sucking imp he had for a sister. _

_Zuko waited for him outside his room, so that the minute he went out, they'd go flying off to the festival. The door opened and a teenage boy had come out. He was probably about eighteen and looked the same as Zuko, except that he kept all of his hair, instead of shaving all of it like Zuko did, and had brown eyes, which must have been a trait from his aunt's side of the family. Lu Ten looked down at him and said, "Ready to go?" _

"_Yeah!" Zuko yelled as a childlike smile grew on his face of excitement and, while waving his arms, let off a small fire blast luckily facing the ground. _

"_You're all fired up I guess!" sighed Lu Ten. _

_Zuko bit his tongue and blushed from embarrassment, but his grin could not be shaken. _

"_But before we go, put on this," his cousin told him handing him a cloak. "I think it would be best if we don't bring any attention to ourselves while we're there don't you think?" Zuko nodded, putting on the cloak as instructed. Enshrouded with his cloak, Lu Ten set off to the festival, followed by the cloaked blur that was Zuko._

_As they walked through the town they treated themselves to the main attractions of the festival. First, Zuko went over some fire nuts. His cousin warned him not to put so many in his mouth at the same time, but it was too late: Zuko was wailing, running around in circles in search for water. He was straining himself to keep his mouth shut to avoid making a scene, but before long, a blast of fire came out of his mouth, which shot everywhere. Lu Ten finally saved the day with a glass of water he had gotten from another booth nearby. The little boy drank it up as fast as possible, letting a deep steamy sigh of relief come out of his mouth. _

"_Hey, look at what that clumsy kid did to my stand!" yelled the keeper. "He almost burned it completely to the ground!" When Zuko heard this, a shiver went done his spine as he slowly turned around to see the damage that he had caused. _

"_Wah!" Zuko yelped as he surveyed the damage. Most of the stand was in ashes and the food was ruined. Lu Ten began to calm the shopkeeper, eventually paying him for the damage. As Lu Ten walked up to him, Zuko was looking down, too ashamed to meet him eye to eye. He suddenly felt a firm tap on the shoulder, and, looking up, was surprised to see his cousin smiling. _

"_It's ok, no harm done…at least you didn't barbecue someone!" Zuko laughed at that and on they went going to see what other things the festival had in store for them. He really loved his cousin, he was always getting him out of trouble, and even though sometimes the heat would fall on him, Lu Ten seemed not to care. To Zuko, Lu Ten was the most amazing person in the world. _

_They saw the magicians doing their dangerous stunts of manipulating fire, forming from them mythical beasts and awesome shapes like dragons and phoenixes rings in the air. His favorite was what the magician called "Taming the Dragon." He admired the precision that the magician had controlling the flaming beast. He wished that he could be that great a Firebender. _

_He had just starting learning how to form his fire about a year ago, but still couldn't manage to control the flame. Most of the time, because of this lack of control, he would set the everything in the palace on fire, from the drapes, to the family dinner table and all the cloths on it, and even Azula's hair, when she refused to give up calling him the name that he loathed the most, "Zuzu." _

_He couldn't forget the face she had when she finally found out that more than half her hair was already dust. She was furious. He knew that she would never let that go, and always tried to humiliate him in order to repay the debt. Even when he ended up as a wanted outlaw, she still tried to find new ways to mock him whenever they met. _

_As he kept on watching he saw who the volunteer or "captive princess" of the show. She was a beautiful young girl about his age, but as the dragon grew closer and closer to her, he saw how her little face turned from wonder into fear. Each time the dragon flew by, the girl squinted her eyes, fearing that the embers of the dragon would burn her face. Zuko saw this and knew that he had to do something. He quickly ran towards the stage, leaving his cousin behind. Lu Ten, however, didn't perceive this until Zuko was already jumping up on the stage running towards the girl. The crowd wondered what he was doing there in the first place, but thought that it was part of the show. _

"_Zuko, get of there, now!" yelled his cousin, but it was already too late. The fiery dragon was making its final swirl around the stage, charging in at the princess and Zuko. He stood there taking up the stance that his uncle had taught him for bending, breathed deep and from his mouth exhaled a ferocious fire ball which devoured the dragon in seconds. The people saw as how even after the clash between the dragon the fireball flew higher towards the sky. The people looked at him strangely, wondering who the kid was, but then they all started cheering. _

"_What are you trying to do, kid, upstage me?" said the frustrated magician, but all Zuko could do was blush, because he had made so many people happy. He was laughing with them too as they asked how long since he had begun bending, how he got that strong, and who his teacher was. _

_But then, his cousin pulled him from the crowd scolding, "What on earth do you think you're doing? Do you really want to get killed? What would your mother say if she knew what you did just now, or worse, what would your father say?" Lu Ten apparently was very angry for having been ditched like that, but he was more worried for the safety of Zuko, and Zuko could see that. _

_Zuko felt really bad for having made him worry like that, but then asked him, "Lu Ten, we're both princes, right?" _

"_Yeah, I guess so, why would we live in a huge palace if it were otherwise?" his cousin responded sarcastically. _

"_Well, don't princes usually save damsels in distress?" Zuko said, getting red around his face. _

_His cousin took of his serious face and started to smile and he laughed a little too. "I think my dad has been telling you too many fairytales," he said. _

_Lu Ten looked up at the sky, and then back at his imaginative cousin. "I think that we'd better get you home before your mom sends the National Guard to look for us!" _

_Zuko looked up smiling, and nodded in agreement. "Hey Lu Ten, are you going to tell my mom and dad what I did?"_

_Lu Ten looked back at him and answered happily, "Nope, but what you're going to tell me is how you managed to make such a big fireball. I don't think that anyone at your age could do something as comparable in power as you did." _

_Zuko smiled from the compliment his, which was even more special coming from Lu Ten. "I've always been able to do it, I guess…my problem isn't in letting the fire out, but controlling it and keeping it in." _

"_Well whatever reason it is, I know one thing: you will surely become a powerful bender, because if you're so strong now imagine what you'll be like when you're my age! Not even Azula, being the little prodigy that she is, will be able to even consider herself to be on the same plateau as you!" _

_Zuko thought about that, about the day when he would actually be stronger than Azula, or even better, be stronger than his cousin, but at the same time got sad and a tear went down his cheek. "But already with the power I got I cause only damage and harm to other people, how would it be then? Sometimes, I wish I weren't a bender at all!" _

_His cousin grabbed Zuko by the shoulder and looked him in the eye, saying to him sternly, "Don't be ashamed of what you are and of what you can do. Your heart is in the right place, wanting to not hurt anyone, but giving up your bending would be like burying a piece of your soul! I know that it seems a little bit hard and far away, but someday you WILL be able to control your power and then NOTHING will be able to stop you, not even your father!" With that, he wiped away Zuko's tear. "Come on, we're going to be late." Zuko felt a little better after hearing his cousin's speech, walking beside him as they made their way back to the palace._

_As they walked, Zuko saw a shop selling masks at the exit of the town centre which led off to the palace. As they walked past it, Zuko stopped. He looked up to the masks in awe. Each had their own special shape, form and color, but a very special one had caught his eye. It was the Blue Spirit mask. _

_At first, when Zuko saw it he stepped back, knocking into Lu Ten, who was walking behind him. It was an amazingly fierce looking mask. _

_Lu Ten noticed the boy's fascination and looked at the mask, remembering the legend. "That mask is of the Blue Spirit, the defending champion of all fire nation people. A long time ago, when the fire nation was still a small village, a fierce evil giant Earth serpent came to destroy us. The soldiers fought fiercely against the serpent, but to no avail, and things were getting worse by the day._

"_But then, one day a young soldier stepped up towards the beast with the whole village behind him. The soldier was infused with the flame of all the Firebenders present, and their strong will to keep their little village alive. The soldier then transformed into a noble spirit of the most purest and powerful fire: the cold fire, lightning. He alone stood up against the Earth serpent, vanquishing him with his awesome power. It is said that he will appear to those who are in most dire need of help, and to face all those who have evil essences." _

_Then, he looked down to Zuko, who still didn't take his eyes of the mask for one second, even more awed by it than before, until he said, "Do you want it?" _

_Zuko stared up at him full of wonder, and nodded yes as hard and fast as he could and soon enough, Zuko was a new toy home with him. He put on the mask and looked up to his cousin. _

"_How do I look?" he asked. The mask was still too big for his head, and shifted a bit to the left, uncovering a piece of his face. _

"_Very powerful, almost as the Spirit himself!" Lu Ten told him in teasing tone. Zuko, happy with his new mask, he decided to wear it him all the way home, so that he could surprise his mother and uncle. _

_Suddenly as they crossed the small forest that was just in between the palace and the festival, rustling sounds were heard from the bushes and three suspicious-looking thugs came out of hiding. Two came up to the front, while the leader, was positioned in the back. _

"_Well, well what do we got here?" said the leader. "I think we got ourselves a good for nothin' punk and a sorry excuse for an imp!" _

_The gang started to laugh, but all Zuko felt was a numb sensation in his legs. He wanted to run but his legs felt like lead, and he couldn't fight: he still had mastered neither his aim nor his control over fire. That was when Lu Ten stretched his arm out signaling Zuko to get back behind him. He put his grip on the two broad swords he was carrying with him, hidden in his cloak, preparing for the worst. _

_The leader signaled his team to go for the attack. The first one charged right in front of the two princes. Just as the thug was about to reach him, Lu Ten pulled out half way his broad swords, hitting the thug in the stomach sending him sailing through the air. The second, along with the leader, then tried their hands at attacking Lu Ten, both trying to hit him from different angles. In that instant, Lu Ten pushed Zuko aside, just far enough for him to start waving his swords around him, spinning in the same place where he stood to generate a tornado made completely of fire. The two thugs were too close in on Lu Ten before they could react, and were deeply burned. _

_Zuko was impressed with his cousin's power and understood why he would be next in line for the throne, after his uncle, of course. Zuko looked as if Lu Ten's mastery of the broad swords was the best thing the carnival had to offer. _

"_Do you want to know how to fight without having to depend on your bending, so that you could control the damage that you inflict without worrying about how much strength you put in to your attacks?" _

_Zuko looked confused: he thought that the only way to fight was through Firebending. He thought that was why his parents stressed it so much. _

"_Here," Lu Ten said, handing him the two broad swords he just used in the combat. "I think that I'm going to give you your very first lesson!" _

_Zuko took the swords immediately and started to slash around where he was, cutting the bushes and stabbing the defenseless trees. _

"_Lesson number one, when using dual broad swords, you must always remember that they are not separate weapons. They are two halves of a single whole, and you must always use them in unison. If not, they will not last long enough against other weapons." _

_Zuko started to wave the swords around like his new instructor told him, and by Lu Ten's standards, he performed fairly well. _

"_I think you got the basics down; tomorrow night, we'll try doing something more advanced, but only if you keep practicing your Firebending, ok?" _

"_Ok," answered Zuko excitedly. He was finally learning something that he was good at from the beginning, and the best part was that he would finally have a way to defend himself without the possibility of burning his enemy or innocent bystanders to death. _

_They were finally making their way up to the palace, when Zuko realized something. "Lu Ten, what happened to the Blue Spirit afterwards?" _

"_Since he was the reincarnated fighting-will of the Fire Nation, he was condemned to fight for them, or otherwise lose his awesome power; so he did. He fought and eliminated all of the enemies of the Fire Nation village. After that, he fought in secrecy in the wars against the other rivaling villages and tribes that were done over the lands that make up the Fire Nation today, until he found himself with a beautiful maiden from another tribe…I think either she was from a Waterbending, or it could have been Earth, I can't remember…But anyway, he found someone from another nation." _

"_He did what!" yelled Zuko in total disbelief. "From another nation, was he crazy? He gave it all up for someone from another nation?" _

_Lu Ten sighed and looked at his younger, immature cousin saying, "At that time, there was no war between the other nations. Everyone was at peace and all was balanced, but still he did give it all up for her. She calmed his mind and made him feel for the first time at peace, giving him in return something far more valuable than power!" _

"_Yeah and what's that?" said his cousin in a disappointed tone. _

"_Love, love is something far more powerful and valuable. Love for your country, for your people, for your family and friends, and love for that special someone you carry in your heart. It is the fuel that prompts us to become stronger and surpass our limitations. It's what makes us become better people." _

_Zuko looked at him in a really funny way and said, "You almost sound like your dad". _

_Lu Ten chuckled and added, "I hope I'm not that old!" _

_Zuko and Lu Ten both laughed as they made it up to their palace, hoping that they would remember that day forever._

Zuko, illuminated by the fire from one hand, placed on his face the mask of the Blue Spirit with the other. Every time he wore it, he felt as if the spirit of Lu Ten were there to help him: to lend him his strength and to guide him to his prize.

He quickly changed outfit, removing his old Earth Kingdom rags, and put on his black infiltration wear. Grabbing a black sash, he wrapped it around his waist, using it to stow the broad swords that his cousin had given to him as a present on his tenth birthday. Putting out the flame he created, he scaled the shack so that he could get a better view of the unsuspecting prey he would attack next, so that he could go on living.

He hated himself for doing this: he knew that this was no way for a prince to act, and at the same time, felt as if he were disappointing Lu Ten for misusing his teachings. He looked up to the sky, remembering the days of his childhood where he spent most of his time training.

_During the day, Zuko would start Firebending practice with his uncle from dawn until dusk. While he enjoyed spend time with his uncle and away from the dark insides of the palace, he hated trying to control his power. His uncle could see the frustration in his eyes whenever Zuko couldn't get the basic sets right. _

_Whenever Zuko had to move and shift positions, he would hesitate, being uncertain if it were the right step of the set. When he had to shoot a jet of fire, he tried with all of his might to make it proper, but inevitably it would get too small, to become just a miniscule flare. And to top it all off, his sister Azula would be close by with her top teachers, advancing set after set in a matter of minutes. _

"_Don't worry Prince Zuko, you'll get it eventually. It's not how fast you can master the sets but how well you perform them" _

"_But even when I'm doing them at the speed of a turtle I STILL can't do it right!" yelled his nephew. Zuko really hated those practices, but he knew that he had something better to look forward to after sunset, something that he knew he was good at. _

_Sunset had come, and outside the palace walls in the forest where they had their first class, was his new teacher already waiting for him, lying back on a tree. _

"_Ok Zuko, ready to practice some sword wielding?" his new instructor would ask, and Zuko could only show a face full of excitement as he picked up the dual blades into his hands. _

_Lu Ten would run him through every single position, attack, block, counter, and set that he knew. Each time he practiced, Zuko got better and better. He loved the way his swords looked when they would swish and slash through the night. They reflected the light of the moon, making it look as if two spirits were dancing around each other. It was absolutely mystifying. _

"_Good Zuko! Good…you've got the motion and position learned, but how well can you extract this information in a real fight?"_

"_Huh?" Zuko looked at him clueless of what he meant. _

"_I want you to fight me with all you got!" _

_Zuko's face showed fear, but he quickly shook it off, and with a wry smile to his cousin, he said, "Prepare to lose," beginning a charge. _

_The swords would clash and sparks would fly everywhere. Of course, Lu Ten controlled his strength against his cousin, since Zuko was at a big disadvantage, but with the charges that he made, he forced Zuko to learn the positions and maneuvers by instinct. _

_These were pretty much the practices that they had after sunset for the next two years until on Zuko's tenth birthday, right after the party, which ended at sunset, he went running to his training ground and like normal, his instructor was there. He was really anxious that day because he had all his energy stored up because he had no Firebending exercises that day. _

"_Zuko, tonight I won't be giving you anymore lessons because there's nothing else that I know that I can teach you." _

_With that, he extended to Zuko a package wrapped in a purple cloth. Unwrapping it, Zuko looked at Lu Ten in awe. "I can't take these." They were Lu Ten's dual broad swords. _

"_I want you to have these as a gift to remember me by," he said in a grim voice. "I'm going off with my dad to the war front tonight so this will be our last lesson together."_

"_Why do you have to go, why can't you guys stay here with us?" Zuko was almost crying then, he didn't want to lose his beloved cousin/brother. _

"_My dad is a General, and I'm the son of a General. We have our duties to our people, to our loved ones." _

"_You're going to fight for us, like the Blue Spirit once did right?" Zuko said, his voice cracking. _

"_Yes, and we'll fight with the same will and power that he did so that our nation can be safe." Lu Ten put his hand on Zuko's head, saying to him, "I'm giving these to you so that you can practice while I'm gone. By the time I get back, I want you to be the most powerful swordsman and Firebender that I know you can be, understood?" _

_Tears were already falling from Zuko's face, "Ye- yeah I'll be the best fighter the fire nation has ever seen, even more powerful than the Blue Spirit!" _

"_I'm glad" Lu Ten smiled. He knelt down and embraced Zuko in his arms giving him a last farewell. _

_With that, Lu Ten disappeared into the bush, taking a short cut to the outside of the palace where his father was awaiting him. Zuko took another path, running for his life so that he could say goodbye to his uncle, but as he was just making it, the wagon and the rest of the soldiers were mounted, beginning the journey out of the Fire Nation. He was crying, feeling that he had already lost Lu Ten, but then he looked down to the gift that he gave him and remembered that his cousin was a very powerful fighter and bender, probably even better than Uncle Iroh, so he wiped off his tears and returned to the palace, knowing that he would see his cousin again._

_Ever since then, Zuko practiced his swordsman skills under the night sky, keeping it a secret from the rest of his family. It was the secret that he and Lu Ten had together, so if he were to ever get caught with that secret, he wanted Lu Ten to be at his side to share the credit. And every night just before he went to sleep, he went searched under his mattress and pulled out the mask that his cousin had given him, staring into it while hoping that the Blue Spirit would protect his cousin just as it had done so long ago with the first Fir Nation villagers. _

_But unfortunately, that wasn't meant to be. When the news that Lu Ten had died in combat at Ba Sing Se, Zuko felt devastated. He couldn't believe that his older brother would never come back again. _

_He ran to his room and pulled out the mask from his bed and yelled at it in an uncontrollable rage, "Why didn't you protect him, like you should have, wasn't he a member of the Fire Nation, too?" _

_The mask would not answer him back. It only stared coldly into his eyes with no expression. Zuko pulled it back to him again and began to weep for his beloved cousin, instructor and older brother. He knew that he had to be strong for Lu Ten's sake, so he began to practice even harder than ever, so that he may one day fulfill his cousin's optimistic expectations, that he would too become a great warrior and Prince for his people...so that one day, no enemies would be able to touch the Fire Nation and all his loved ones would be safe. _

_But unfortunately, he learned that love was not something that gave men a fuel to increase their strength, but on the contrary made them weak. In this department, his instructors were his parents. He felt as though his mother had betrayed him by leaving him behind, and his father taught him that love for anyone is weak that people were only instruments to be used to gain power. It was with this in mind that Zuko left after being exiled, determined to use the Avata to reclaim the power that was rightfully his, his throne. _

Zuko shook his head, trying to clear the dark memories. As he came back into his senses, he decided that it was time to move. He began moving from rooftop to rooftop, in search of unaware prey that would provide him with another chance at survival. That was when he heard a scream from a few streets down; he rushed to see what was going on.

He saw three Earthbenders chasing someone. The leader of the benders was probably the father of the other two, but the thief they were chasing…he recognized her. It was that girl that always accompanied the Avatar! What was her name?

"Katara," he breathed, recalling her name from the many encounters he had had with the Avatar. He saw as how she ran, trying to escape the Earthbenders.

Even though she was indeed the enemy, she was very beautiful. She had grown a lot from their encounter at the North Pole physically, although he couldn't believe he noticed that when they met even more recently in that ghost town, when his uncle was sucker-shot by Azula. He saw curves on her that he never saw before until that very moment. She was quite beautiful, reminding him of the princess that he saved when he was a boy in the festival. In fact, they were almost identical except for the loops that Katara had braided in her hair, and the fact that she had a deeper tan, but other than that identical. Still, she was the enemy.

As they ran he followed them, hoping rooftop to rooftop, wanting to observe how the little Water peasant was going to get out of this one.

But to his surprise, she was taking many blows, overcome by the power and number of Earthbenders attacking her. He saw as they began to close in on her, steadily like a pack of lions cornering their prey, waiting to land the final blow.

He couldn't understand why at that moment he wanted to jump in and save her. It was like when he was a kid and he saw the look of fear in the little girls face. Before him was another princess, another damsel in distress that needed a prince, even an exiled prince, to save her. When the final blow was about to be dealt to Katara, he jumped in just in time, breaking the boulders with his swords.

Even though she was the enemy, he offered to carry her on his back and take her to safety. As he walked towards the shack where he was residing he couldn't help but like carrying her on his back.

She smelled sweet even though she had been running for her life, and on top of that he liked the feel of her body on his back…the body a young woman. As he continued with these thoughts he felt for a moment that he was betraying the Blue Spirit for having taken his noble form to save a stranger from an enemy tribe, one that would not hesitate to destroy his home in one blast…but worst of all he felt as if he was betraying the word of his older brother.

**Well this was the end of chapter two. I don't know if you people like it when the stories are long or not, but I really felt that his chapter had to be somewhat long to get all the facts in about Zuko's "inner turmoil" as his uncle likes to call it, But it's for the reader to get an idea as to what obstacles he has to go through in order to find out what he really wants. Kind of like the resent version of the legend of the Blue Spirit in a way, to want love or power and the cost of each. All reviews are strongly encouraged, except really negative ones **


	3. No Regrets

**Well hi there! I just want to thank you for the reviews that I have gotten, they really mean a lot to me and at the same time help me learn so that next time I can do it better. **

**Some people said that they didn't understand very well what was going on last chapter so to make it really short what happened is that Zuko has lots of power but can't control it so he hates himself and always does the minimum effort so the power won't take over and hurt people so his cousin helps him by teaching another way of fighting. When his cousin dies he hates himself and the mask because he didn't want to become weak. He tries to keep love in himself, but loses it to all the tragedies in his life and learns that raw power is everything, meaning that his throne is what really matters. Well if you understood that good, if not please keep emailing me so that maybe with your help we can make this story have some sense for the people that just don't get it. **

**Ch 3: No Regrets**

As the Blue Spirit carried her, Katara began to feel a little worried. She was indeed safe from the Earthbenders, but was she safe with this mysterious outlaw? Worse was that in her condition, she couldn't make it alone to go save her friends with the medicine she had worked so hard to steal.

Katara wondered how Aang and the others were holding up. If by some miracle the fever were receding, then she still might have the chance to succed. She had never felt so miserable in her whole life.

"No, I can't think like that…they're ok, I know they are! They're strong…they just have to hang on a little more!" Katara repeated over and over in her thoughts.

Her thoughts returned to her savior. She couldn't believe that she actually accepted help from a complete stranger; her instinct, the same instinct her brother told her to trust as it would never let her down, was that he was good.

"Plus," she thought, blushing a bit, "I certainly don't mind him carrying me."

A biting chill swept through the air, making her shiver. Even though the South Pole's temperatures had been far lower, she had been away from home for so long that she had become accustomed to the mild temperatures of the woods. As she lay on his back, she felt him emanate a comforting warmth. It was as if she were standing right under the sun's welcoming rays.

"How could anyone be so warm at a freezing temperature like this?" she wondered, contemplating her savior's identity. As soon as the Earthbenders recognized him, they shrank back in terror and ran like crazy, as if he really were an evil spirit. She checked the walls of buildings as they traveled, thinking that if he were such a terrible person, then wanted posters should have covered the town…but on the walls there were only the remnants of torn down papers.

"Maybe they were from the wanted posters," she thought; maybe he wanted to keep a low profile, taking down all of the posters when no one was looking.

As Zuko carried her, he couldn't help but get somewhat aroused from feeling her body on his back….her chest pressing against him. It was driving him crazy. How could he feel anything for this… this .. Water peasant? He suddenly felt his body starting to warm up: but instead of "warming up" like any normal teenager would, it was as if he were preparing to Firebend.

Out of his gloves and clothes, steam started to slowly hiss out, escaping skywards. He was losing his control again. For the first time since finally having mastered it in his childhood, he was losing control again.

"Why did this have to happen now?" he thought, feeling very stupid and ashamed of the knowledge that the cause was a physical attraction he had to a peasant!

He didn't understand how this could happen. He knew that the origin of his loss of control was the biggest glitch that all Firebenders had to manage: emotions. He had allowed a feeling of lust get the best of him. As a child, he eventually learned how to rule his emotions by rejecting to all of them, but apparently, _that_ technique was going up in steam, literally. He was getting warmer by the second, so he started to concentrate, trying to think of something else.

"Ten more shops to pass until we reach the shack... nine more shops… eight more shops… seven more shops… six more shops…" The steam began to dissipate, and slowly his body temperature stabilized and began to descend.

He never managed to bring it down completely to normal, only to a level where he wouldn't be given away as a Firebender. Because if she did know, she would undoubtedly let him go to lie injured on the street, preferring death by the Earthbenders' hands than accepting his help. He couldn't carry the death of someone innocent on his conscience, even the life of an enemy.

Having spent the longest ten minutes of his life intensely concentrating, they finally arrived to the shack. Without hesitation, he entered the shack, depositing the injured girl on the bed and retreating to the opposite side of the room.

As the Blue Spirit searched for medical supplies across the room, Katara examined her surroundings carefully. From the dust on the window and floor, it looked as if no one had lived in the shack in ages. Turning her head, she saw that right next to her a stack of papers. Carefully stretching her injured arms, Katara managed to bring the stack closer to her.

In the stack were the wanted posters that she wondered about. On it there were five outlaws drawn and listed, along with their crimes against the Fire Nation.

The first one on the left hand corner was Jeong Jeong. She had always wondered what had become of him. She read under the picture his crime against the fire nation: "Has dishonored his nation through the rebellious action of rejecting his post and escaping arrest on multiple occasions." Glad to read the last part, she was sure he would continue being safe, being a Firebending master.

The next on the poster was Iroh, the former Dragon of the West. He had seemed nice enough during their encounters for a Firebender and Katara didn't have an issue with him, unlike his enraged nephew. Similar to Jeong Jeong, his crime was treason and escaping arrest. Katara frowned, a little bit worried about him, too. She remembered the day when he was shot by Azula's blue fire. She remembered the Zuko's face when he saw his uncle lie there, motionless. He was so sad and so angry. Even though they were enemies, she had offered to help, but Zuko wouldn't let her. It was the first time that she had seen a human side to Zuko, remembering her amazement that he could actually care for someone so.

The one she recognized, which probably was the biggest picture was drawn on the poster was of Aang. His supposed crimes were for creating insurrection against the Fire Lord and evading arrest. Katara smiled slightly as she noticed the poster mentioned that he should be approached cautiously because he was traveling with a Waterbending and Earthbending master and a Water Tribe warrior. She couldn't believe it: she was an outlaw. The idea seemed fun to her, but the she realized that as soon as she saw her friends again, she would have to tell them to start acting cautiously, as they were all wanted now.

On the other side of the room, Zuko had started a miniature fire for boiling tea, so that she could drink and thus relax the pain of her wounds. He also took out of his bag the old rags that he wore when dressed as an Earth Kingdom refugee, and some algae-looking plants. Zuko began to wash the rags, turning them into clean bandages; afterwards, he mixed the algae with water and crushed the mixture into a pulp using a stone.

The Blue Spirit first treated her wounded ankle. He tried to be as gentle as possible, maneuvering her body so carefully it was as though she were made of glass. Katara felt reassured by the kindness the Spirit showed her, and as she looked back to the poster, sure enough: there he was, the Blue Spirit, in the corner towards the bottom.

"There you are!" she said excitedly. Zuko startled. He thought that his uncle had gotten rid of those, but apparently he must of thought that someday not so far off, they would make excellent portraits for a family album. He was uneasy now, thinking that she would revoke her trust, knowing he was an outlaw. As he tended to her ankle, placing the finishing wraps around it with the rags, and making sure that it wasn't too loose or too tight, he took peeps to check the expression on her face. It seemed to be smiling.

Katara's eyes widened in disbelief. She read out loud to the Spirit, "The Blue Spirit, enemy of the fire nation and of the welfare of its people, committed the crime of assisting the Avatar, the most mortal enemy to the fire nation, by taking him as a hostage out of a military post under the control of Admiral Zhao. He is not be approached under any circumstance, for he is a deadly killer, who took out more than half of the security of the facility by himself. The reward for his capture is 10,000 gold pieces."

Zuko's stomach turned upside down. He had always regretted the day when he saved the Avatar's life from his mortal enemy and rival. Not only was he unable to take the Avatar to his father, but at the worst moment for weakness, he was saved by his prey!

He stood up and set her foot gently onto the bed. Katara looked at him, her face glowing with the moonlight that beamed through the window as she took in a deep breath and began to ramble.

"You're the one that saved Aang from Admiral Zhao! And here I was thinking that you were actually an evil outlaw. Aang told me that someone with a mask had saved him from Zhao, but I never thought that I would actually meet you! You're probably the most courageous righteous person in the world for having done all that alone, standing up to those fire nation bullies and taking them down, one by one, and without bending! Any friend of Aang's is a friend of mine. I'm Katara of the water tribe, what's your name? Oops, it must have slipped my mind…here it is, pointing with her finger to his picture on the wanted poster." She giggled in embarrassment for having forgotten in it so quickly even though it was practically in her face.

Shocked, Zuko's jaw hung down to practically mid-air. He couldn't believe his ears. He would have never expected so many compliments to be said about him in one sentence. And to top it all of, they came from her. He quickly recovered, but blushed an intense red behind his mask.

Suddenly, he began to feel hot again, from his hands this time. He panicked, looking for a quick solution. He turned to the tea, which was still far from boiling, so he walked to it as fast as he could and, taking off his fighting gauntlets, he pressed his hands on the kettle as hard as he could, making the water boil and the kettle whistle. He sighed from relief that his secret was still his own, though he wondered why the girl was not surprised by his strange action. But then, he looked over his shoulder to her and saw her eyes shining with hatred.

She was looking at Zuko's picture on the wanted poster. She knew that Zuko wasn't totally bad, but she still couldn't find a way to forgive him for what he had done over the months that he had spent chasing them. Scaring and invading her village, stealing her mother's necklace trying to use it as a hostage so that she would give information about Aang, and last but not least, trying to use Aang to bolster his image by turning him in to the Fire Lord.

Zuko paled as he observed her through the cold eyes of the Spirit mask. He knew that she still hated him—hated him with every fiber of her being. He was glad that he had his mask on, because right now if she were given the chance, she would have not hesitated in trying to attack him. Shaking his head and looking away, he poured her a cup of tea.

Walking over to her, he extended the tea cup to her as formally as possible. She tried to lift her arms to receive the tea, but struggled from her earlier injuries. Each time she would try to stretch her arms, she would flinch from the pain. Instinctively, he helped her into a more upright position, placing his left hand on her back, and putting the tea cup to her lips. When he saw that she had enough, he took the cup gently away from her.

Katara let a small sigh slip past her lips, and she observed the observed the mask, losing herself in the black, hollow eyes of the mask. Her grandmother, Kana, had taught her that someone's true personality can always be told through their eyes, no matter what expression they had on their face, but all she got from the mask was a deep feeling of loneliness. She wondered if that was the way the Spirit felt, lonely. If only she knew the half of it.

As she looked up into the mask with calm, tender blue eyes, she whispered, "Thank you, kind Spirit."

Zuko couldn't take it. He was happy beyond question, but at the same time overwhelmingly sad. He looked down to her, admiring her beauty: she was absolutely flawless. He didn't want to ever stop starring at her, until he realized that more than three minutes had passed while he was fixated on her face. He shook his head slightly and came up close to her, again gently helping her up so that he could tend to the rest of her wounds.

He gently helped her remove her coat, trying to make it as painless as possible. As her arm was finally freed from the sleeves, she flinched a little, now left exposed, only in her buttoned, ocean blue shirt.

Zuko, under his mask, began to breath heavily because for the next step, he was totally unprepared. Katara blushed crimson red from embarrassment, understanding what she had to do next for her wounds to be treated properly. Since she couldn't use her bending due to the damage on her arms, she felt like she didn't have a choice, and besides, she trusted the Blue Spirit.

He slowly helped her unbutton her shirt, trying to keep his hand from shaking. His hand trembling as he finally finished unbuttoning the shirt; much to his surprise (and disappointment), however, the shirt slipped off her silky skin but left her in tightly wound cloths that served as a type of undergarment for her. She looked away, her face burning red. Her heart was pounding hard even though she knew that nothing _wrong_ would ever happen. She could feel it from him; even now, she was still treated with respect and kindness. She thought of him as a total gentleman for not acting in an _improper_ way with her. In fact, to her, he seemed to act like a prince.

Zuko eased up a bit, his breathing slowly returning to normal. He wanted to treat her with the utmost respect he could. He was a prince after all: a banished prince, but a prince nonetheless, and that meant acting as a true gentleman of stature at all times. He caressed her shoulders, spreading the homemade remedy he had prepared for her wounds. Through the mushy goop that he placed on her, he felt her soft, smooth skin. As he rubbed the salve into skin, covering up her shoulders almost completely, the only thought in his mind was, "flawless."

When he finished, he placed the only comfortable pillow that he had against the back of the bed, helping her lay against it so that she could rest easily for the night. Immediately when she lay against the pillow, a light blue glow began to emanate from her wounds. Zuko was in awe as he beheld in confusion the unknown glow coming from her body…only to see it suddenly vanish! Zuko blinked his eyes in disbelief. "What the hell happened?" he thought. As soon as the glow disappeared, Katara experimentally stretched her limbs. Apparently, Zuko's remedy was water-based, so when it made contact with Katara's body, she instinctively healed herself!

After stretching and trying out her miraculously-healed limbs, she saw the Blue Spirit standing there motionless, knowing how perplexed he must have been seeing what he saw her do. "It's ok…see, I'm a Waterbender, so I can heal myself with water instantly," she explained to him in a calm tone. She got up out of the bed, starting to get dressed.

As Zuko watched, he could only admire her powers. "She is truly blessed! Like an angel!" He meditated on the great difference between both their powers. He thought of himself as evil reincarnate, whose sole purpose is to destroy, while she was truly an angel of God. She was blessed with the power of creation and the preservation of life.

As she finished getting dressed, she grabbed the medicine bottle that she had stolen and stepped forward to the Spirit. She looked at him seriously, and suddenly brought his masked face down to hers, kissing him slightly on the cheek.

"Thank you for your help, but I have to go help my friends now. I'll tell Aang that I finally had the honor to meet you, noble Spirit." And with that she made it to the door. She stood there for a moment, looking back at him and waving farewell, and with thatm she raced off into the night to save her friends.

The Blue Spirit closed the door and went to lay on the bed, waiting to be sure that she did leave. When he was completely sure she was gone, he threw his mask off as fast as he could, and smiled. The memory of the kiss kept replaying in his mind, over and over again. He didn't care if she were from another nation. He couldn't even care if she was from another planet! She had totally made his day…or night, to be more precise.

He lay there starring into the abyss of the crumbling ceiling above him. He began to remember the days when he hated himself for having saved the Avatar from his rival, but he realized that if he hadn't, she wouldn't have been so comfortable around him or given him her trust so easily.

For the first time in ages, he felt complete…at peace with himself. So much excitement was flowing through his body that he didn't realize that he was shooting sparks everywhere around the room until he caught sight of his uncle's tea set, which was melting from the heat emanating from his body. Then he noticed the mattress bursting into flames. Panicking, of course, he fetched buckets of water to put out the fires.

After the room was totally drenched, he laid back again against his wet bed. Even though he knew that he liked her, he couldn't determine whether it was mere infatuation or real love. He pondered on it for a long time being reminded by the tale his cousin told him of the Blue Spirit and the Waterbending girl that claimed his fighting spirit. Zuko felt as if he and Kataraa belonged in that tale, and how his previous heroic action seemed to be from the fairytales he had heard as a child, of princes saving damsels in distress. It was all too perfect…except for the fact that she loved the Blue Spirit, and not him.

He couldn't stand it anymore. There was a war going on inside of him. One half, telling him to chase after her and reveal his true identity; and the other part, telling him not to be so stupid as to risk giving his identity away and getting killed because of it.

He knew that if he joined her, he would have to give up the search and kidnapping of the Avatar, thereby giving up his only ticket home to his throne and the power that came with it. But he would end up lonely, like the Spirit after he had defeated all of his enemies. He shook his head violently. He loved her; she complimented his destructive power with the power of healing and made his soul feel free.

He had made up his mind: he would go to his uncle, tell him the news that he had fallen in love with someone special, and that he wanted to join that girl and be with her forever, even if it meant giving up his throne. So he grabbed his mask and tied a string through the holes that it had in each side, hanging it around his neck to rest against his back.

He placed his broad swords under his belt and wrapped a cloak around himself. Finally ready, he ran out the door, making his way to the tavern where his uncle was still passing the night in his Pai Sho tournament, thinking about the difficult decision he had made with no regrets whatsoever in his mind.

**Well there you have it people! See I told you that I'd put some real Zutara in here soon and so I did! I hope that this chapter is easier to read and follow than the other ones. Well I'm off to continue with the next chapter and don't forget to keep those reviews coming!**


	4. Coming to Terms

**Hello Yellow Jell-O! Well I can't believe it my fourth chapter already. It feels so good to know that my first fic wasn't a complete disaster, yet narrows eyes looking as if trying to warn the negative karma to stay away from the precious work Well anyways as always I appreciate your reviews and for those who have been reviewing me since chapters 1-3, if you check my homepage in my profile there should be a thank you list to all those who gave out good reviews or had me on their alert list because you guys became the voices in my head that said keep on going! And now I must say something that I haven't said in a really long time so that my ass will be totally safe from all corporate harm….**

**Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA nor will I ever, unless of course the C.E.Os of the place are willing to give it to me as a Christmas present, but I really doubt it so no I don't own it and nor will I ever. **

**And now without anymore interruptions or weird ramblings, My lords, My lady's and anybody else that actually likes to hear me ramble I present to you chapter 4!**

**Ch 4: Coming to Terms **

When Zuko finally made it to the tavern, he flipped over the mantle that served as its door and walked in. The place was a wreck. Much of the furniture was reduced to ash or had brun marks, barely holding up. At the scene, he found many people rattled, talking about what had happened.

Zuko was worried as he searched for his uncle between the survivors, but he couldn't spot him anywhere. A gripping fear began to circulate through him. He felt a firm hand being placed on his shoulder. Zuko turned around excitedly.

"Uncle!" he said with smile of relief on his face, which quickly transformed into a frown as he discovered it wasn't him, but the bartender of the tavern.

"You better have a seat," he said, directing him to the nearest table that still looked strong enough to hold up despite its charred features.

"You must be Zuko, right?"

Zuko nodded. "What happened here? Where's my uncle?"

The bar tender sighed deeply and answered, "Three young women entered the bar looking for a couple of drinks. They were still underage, but they told me that if I didn't get them anything, they would burn my tavern to the ground, so I caved in… That was when a rumble started where the Pai Sho tournament was taking place. Apparently, your uncle was winning big time, but the others accused him of cheating and threw the game board aside, with the checkers flying everywhere. That caught the young girls' attention, and they started to attack your uncle.

"The girl that was the leader of the group started to throw fire everywhere, burning my tavern and my customers. She told your uncle that if he didn't turn himself, they would destroy this place along with everyone in it. Your uncle… he sacrificed himself in order to save us. Here, we're always rooting for the outlaws that cause trouble for the Fire Nation, but nobody could really take them on.

"Along with that Firebender were two other dangerous girls: a cheery one that could took away people's bending abilities and the feeling in their limbs, and a silent, weird one that was able to shoot needles and arrows out of her sleeves with the precision of a millimeter. Compared to those three, we were just dominoes waiting to be knocked down!" The bartender was looking at Zuko with a face full of remorse and fault. "She told us that if anyone of us saw you we had to inform them right away, and if not they would come back and would burn the town to the ground!"

"It's all right," Zuko sighed. "I was expecting this to happen anyway. Don't worry…I promise you that I'll make sure that they never come back to this town to cause you any trouble!"

Zuko was aware that he was being pursued and something like this would happen, but the thought had never crossed his mind that she would find him so quickly. That's when the idea hit him.

"The Avatar!" he thought. "Of course she's after the Avatar, but that means that… Katara!" Zuko said as he was beginning to put two and two together. She was in danger, and she had probably already been caught by his sister and her team.

Turning to the bartender, he asked loudly, "Did they tell you where they were going to be for you to inform them about me?"

The bar tender began to scratch his chin until he finally remembered. "The leader of the group…she said that they would be residing in the woods, about four kilometers from here. You're not thinking on going to take them on alone now are you?"

Zuko took a deep breath and turned around, making his way to the door. Without turning, he answered the bartender: "This is something I have to do alone."

Putting on the mask he had stowed on his back as he headed out of town, he gripped the handles of his swords. His hands clutched the swords tighter as he wondered if his uncle and Katara were ok, or if Azula had already begun transporting her prisoners to the Fire Nation.

As such thoughts floated around his head, he reassured himself that his uncle would not allow himself to be so easily controlled. But then, another idea sprang up in his head.

"What if they already caught the Avatar and his friends? What if Katara had been captured along with the Avatar?" He didn't want to think of the consequences that would occur if he allowed Azula to get away, so he ran faster under the night sky.

Meanwhile, Katara was just making it back to the campsite where she had left her group. As she was arriving, she took the cap off the bottle of medicine and, bending water from her canteen, thoroughly mixed the green powder and the water to create a the medicine.

"Guys, I'm back!" she yelled, moving closer to begin dolling out the remedy. Ture to the shopkeeper's words, the medicine seemd to have miraculous effects, as almost immediately Aang's and the other's fevers receded and they began to show signs of life.

The first to fully awaken was Aang, looking at Katara with fatigue leftover from his fever.

"Aang, don't worry. You're all going to be alright," Katara said with a smile on her face.

But Aang weakly whispered back, "Katara… you have to get out of here…"

Stunned, Katara wondered why Aang would say such a thing…until he rolled a little bit to his side to show that his hands were completely bound together and he was unable to bend.

Suddenly fully aware of what was happening, Katara dove to the ground to avoid arrows now flying at her from all directions. She stood up and tried to run back towards the town. But seemingly out of nowhere, a girl twirled in the air and landed right in front of her, punching her right arm and left leg. Katara recognized that girl: it was one of Azula's friends, Ty Lee. Her leg now lame, Katara had difficulty defending herself against Ty Lee's attacks with only the bending of her left arm.

Successfully using her water whip attack to evade the other girl, Katara suddenly felt a sharp pain in the middle of her neck. Trying to move to no avail, Katara was totally paralyzed.

A dark, silent girl came out of hiding from a nearby bush and walked up over to Ty Lee. "It worked, like Azula said it would, didn't it, Ty Lee? What a bore!"

The energetic girl looked over Katara's immobilized body and answered back happily to the other girl, "Yup, just as she said Mai!"

Slowly the third member of their party stalked up, slowly as a hunter saunters over to its fallen prey, and she said with a mocking tone, "And they say that water beats fire, ha! I'm still surprised that you actually took the bait that easily. I mean, when someone lives in a place where they can only eat icy fish, you'd think they'd at least learn the difference between the bait and the actual thing!"

Katara unable to speak or move, feeling only fear flow through her as she recognized the voice of the princess of the Fire Nation.

"Soldiers, take her away to the campsite!" She began to fear what would happen to them all. They would probably be sent to the Fire Nation as soon as possible, in order to be executed… But Aang, he would most certainly end up in a dark, cold cell only being barely kept alive so that he wouldn't die and reincarnate, and the Fire Nation wouldn't have to start their search all over again.

She wished that the Blue Spirit would save her again, but she knew that her luck had already dried up. As she was lifted by a Fire Nation soldier, she saw others carrying her friends back to the princess' campsite.

When they finally arrived, the soldiers tied their arms and legs up so that they could not move or bend. Then they put shackles around both their arms and legs and tied them all to a long chain, connecting them.

Katara looked around. There were about fifty soldiers at their posts, and about the same number of komodo rhinos tied to the trees. She looked over to find Appa tied down to the ground, with some Fire soldiers cruelly teasing him, poking him with their poles and sticks, and laughing at how defenseless the giant beast was.

She sighed and s she came to realize that escape was impossible, at least for the moment. Her friends were still half-asleep, even though the medicine was taking effect, so they couldn't run far even if they had the opportunity to. Not to mention that they didn't have anyway of escaping the binds in the first place: she couldn't bend the water out of her canteen and break them with her whip attack.

Suddenly, painful screams arose on the opposite end of the camp.

"Tell me where he is, old man!" Azula screamed and a whip-like strike was heard. Two more strikes cracked in the air followed by a scream of agony. She squinted hers eyes to see what was going on. Apparently, Azula was torturing some old man with a whip.

"Tie him up with the rest of the prisoners! He's not going to tell us anything soon, that stubborn old man!" Azula yelled as her soldiers recovered from hearing a formerly celebrated General of the Fire Nation scream in pain, beginning to escort him back to where Katara was.

As they approached, Katara was finally able to recognize the old man: it was Iroh. She was somewhat surprised that he survived Azula's first attack on him, a little bit relieved even, but she was left with her mouth agape as she saw the injuries that his own niece had inflicted on him. His back was red and bleeding from the cuts that the whip had inflicted all over. He was panting, trying to recover himself.

Tying him up and shackling, the guards attached Iroh to the same chain as the other prisoners. She couldn't feel sorrier for him, hating Azula and her outrageous cruelty. How could she have been so low as to resort to beating up old people? She observed him as he was with his eyes closed, still recovering from the whips that had taken away all of his breath with screams.

"Are you ok?" she asked. She felt so stupid as to ask such an obvious question, but she felt the need to make contact, anyway.

"Oh, hello there, it's been a while…hasn't it, Katara of the Water Tribe?" the former Dragon of the West answered back. "How's life treating you?" He made an attempt at hiding the pain he felt, though Katara saw through it as his right eyelid still twitched from the contortions his face had made moments ago.

"Why was Azula beating you like that? Who was she asking about?"

"Ahh, my diabolical niece was asking about her most **favorite brother** in the whole wide world!" he said with a touch of sarcasm.

"You mean Zuko's not with you?" she asked with some curiosity, since they had always traveled together.

"Luckily…I hope he was smart enough to get out of town and as far away as possible, before Azula spots him."

Moans began to come from behind Katara: her friends were waking up.

"Ah! Fire Nation camp! We're in a Fire Nation camp! We're all going to die!" cried Sokka from disbelief, as if he were in a terrible nightmare.

"Shut it, Sokka," ordered his sister. "Do you want them to come here and beat the life out of you?" Sokka quickly closed his mouth and began to observe his surroundings, landing his sight on the beaten Iroh.

"What is he doing here? And if he's here, then **he's**…" Sokka turned his head to look around, searching for the exiled prince.

"If you mean where's Zuko, then he's not here, so you can stop worrying yourself. And besides, none of us can do anything: they strapped us down with locks, ropes, knots, everything!"

Sokka relaxed his attempts to break free, losing himself in thought as he tried to plan their escape. Aang was already up too, along with Toph who sat next to him. Aang, though, was also muffled by rags so that he couldn't even Airbend through his mouth. Iroh looked back at the other members of Katara's group.

"You're that girl from forest!" He was referring to Toph, of course.

"You're that old man! Wait, you're the uncle to the crazy, ponytail wearing, hot-tempered psycho Zuko!" Iroh looked at her with serious narrow eyes. Katara wished that Toph could actually see just this once so that she would be able to notice the big mistake that she had made, but then her thoughts were broken off by oddly enough, Iroh's laughter.

"Ha-ha, what a great sense of humor this girl has… But I'm sorry to tell you, my dear, that my nephew isn't any of those things, well maybe except for hot-tempered. You see, he gave up that ponytail a long time ago, and psycho isn't how I would describe him, maybe…determined, yeah, that's the word, determined!"

Toph laughed softly from that joke. That was one of Iroh's greatest abilities, to make a bad situation seem good, even if only for a moment.

"So, where is that nephew of yours?" asked a curious Sokka.

"He's hiding from his psycho sister!" Katara said. While Katara answered Sokka's questions, Toph got Aang to lie down on the ground, helping him untie the rags that were muffling him.

As soon as the rags came off Aang took a deep breath and exclaimed, "Thank God! That rag smelled worse than Sokka's sleeping bag.

"Hey, what are you getting at cue ball?" cried Sokka back at him, but the boy was already disinterested in him and was looking around the camp to spot Appa.

"Appa, I'll save you!" The Avatar started to wrestle with his shackles, but they wouldn't even budge. "I can't believe this," Aang sighed. "After being on the run for so long, we've been caught! Now what?"

"Don't worry your bald head, young Avatar," assured Iroh. "I've got a plan." He showed them thumbs up. Taking a deep breath through his nose, he forced it back out in the form of super hot steam on his shackles. As the shackles bathed in the hot steam, they began to glow a bright red, and Iroh began to stretch the hot metal.

He thought that if he could heat the shackles just enough, then maybe they would become easier to break, but try though Iroh might, they didn't budge. Iroh looked at them in disbelief. His steam wasn't hot enough; he needed to use a direct flame on it. Everyone looked at him, hoping that he would be able to break through.

Iroh stopped breathing out steam and looked at them smiling, "No dice!"

"What do you mean, no dice!" exclaimed Sokka. "You never do the thumbs up thing unless you got a sure plan, never!"

"Oh like you got any better ones, genius," Katara said, defending the old man.

Suddenly, in the distance, battle sounds were heard. The soldiers were getting out of their posts and moving towards the front of the camp. Two soldiers making their way up to the captain of the platoon stopped by the prisoners' guards.

"You, come with me to the front. As for you, go warn the princess!" Everyone was confused.

"What's going on over there?"

"Tell her that the Blue Spirit is here, quick!" The two soldiers started running to perform their orders. As for the prisoners, Katara was smiling: her luck hadn't run out yet.

"He's coming; he's actually here to save us!"

"Who's here?" asked Toph.

"It's the Blue Spirit! He's an outlaw that once saved Aang from Admiral Zhao!"

"He what!" exclaimed Sokka. "What, he must be crazy coming to a Fire Nation campsite like this all alone…it's suicide!"

"It's probably nothing for him, since he infiltrated a military fortress of the Fire Nation where they held Aang captive and he took out all of the guards alone! He's practically invincible, right Aang? You were there, you tell them!"

Aang was completely stunned when he heard the name Blue Spirit, for he was the only one in their group who knew the true identity of the Blue Spirit. He looked at Iroh, who only looked back at him with a stern look, as if communicating to him that he knew the Spiriti's identity, so he looked back at Katara and faked a smile, "Yup, he's one of the most powerful swordsmen I've ever met…he'll get us out of here for sure!"

Aang began to wonder what Zuko was really doing here. He thought that Zuko must have lost his marbles to actually try to infiltrate Azula's campsite. Then, he thought of Iroh who was looking gloomily at the floor.

All Iroh could think was, "Zuko, you idiot, why didn't you run?" Aang knew from the expression on Iroh's face that he had nothing to do with it. He actually started to consider the fact that Zuko might actually want to do good and save them!

But then he turned to Katara. "Wait, how do you know about the Blue Spirit?" Aang had never told anyone about the Blue Spirit, only that he was indeed captured by Admiral Zhao, but later escaped.

"Well," began Katara, going a bit red, "when you guys were sick and I went to the town to get the medicine, the shopkeeper there didn't want to sell it to me, so I waited till night time and stole it. When I did the shopkeeper and his sons spotted me stealing it, and they tried to stop me with their Earthbending. I tried to run, but they eventually caught up with me and beat me up pretty bad.

"Finally, when they were going to crush my arms so that I couldn't bend again, there he was! He cut through the boulders and beat the Earthbenders in seconds. Then he took me in and patched me up! He tended to me and with the help of his medicine and some water it had in it, I healed myself! He was so kind and gentle to me…"

Katara finished the story there, not wanting to go into any details that were too personal for her friends to hear. Aang's and Iroh's jaws dropped all the way to the ground when they heard that story. In unison, they could only think: "Zuko…was nice…to her!" His uncle knew that he was of a pure soul that was just closed up, but he never would have imagined that he would have opened himself that much to someone so fast, oddly enough with the supposed **enemy**. He turned, carrying a smile on the inside, his sights going to the battlefield, trying to spot Zuko.

"This will be interesting!" he said to himself.

Aang, on the other hand, couldn't get over the shock. He could never picture the ruthless Zuko that he knew being gentle or kind. It was as if someone were trying to teach a fish to play the flute. Impossible! But then he remembered the day when Zuko freed him, when he knew him only as the Blue Spirit. Aang really owed him his life. If he were caught, Zuko might have not lived till the next sunrise, and Zuko knew it. He knew that Zuko's main intentions were probably to take him to the Fire Lord himself, but he felt too that Zuko had some good in him and that maybe, all that time in the dessert caused Zuko to realize that he could be good. He stood there, watching how the soldiers rushed to the front trying to stop Zuko.

Zuko was doing everything in his power to create enough chaos to throw the soldiers out of his way. He cut loose the komodo rhinos and let them run free, and he blocked and sent back the fireballs shot at him, which landed on the tents, supplies, and other unlucky soldiers.

After ten minutes of battle, Zuko had made it to where Aang and the rest were tied up. He sprinted to them so that he cut the chains and facilitate their escape, but three arrows and needles were shot straight at him, followed by a jet stream of blue fire. The Blue Spirit quickly reversed course and flipped backwards, barely evading the shots.

Azula, Mai and Ty Lee were only a few feet away from him when they launched their attack against him. Ty Lee held a wanted poster as if it were a magazine she were reading.

"Mai, isn't that guy over there the same guy that's on here?" asked Ty Lee in her usual clueless tone.

"The Blue Spirit, I presume?" asked Mai, interested. "I've heard rumors about him. That he's a legendary swordsmen, bearing two dual broadswords and a Blue Spirit mask."

Azula then broke in. "Too bad this one is a total disgrace to the memory of the real Blue Spirit!" she shouted. "The real Blue Spirit defended his people from traitors, not the other way around!"

Mai's eyes flashed with exitement. "Azula, please let me fight him. As a fighter that depends on weapons, I want to see if he's a challenge!"

"You're being selfish, Mai! That's very much unlike you," Azula told her. "You would get to have your little legendary fight of one of the greats, but what would Ty Lee and I get out of it?"

An evil grin on her face, Mai explained to Azula: "You know, if we catch this person now, we would be legends in the Fire Nation ourselves for being the team that caught all of the Fire Nation's enemies! Isn't that good enough for all of us, Azula? Your father would see that you are more than fit to rule, and would pass Zuko's birth right to you instead!"

Ty Lee broke in: "Yeah, we got the Avatar and his group, we got your uncle, we get the Spirit now, and we got that weird guy that sounded like he had a frog in his throat—what was his name, Long Long…?"

"Oh you mean Jeong Jeong…he was probably the easiest we ever captured. He must be rotting away in his cell at this very moment!" laughed Azula.

Aang, Katara and Sokka couldn't believe what they heard. Jeong Jeong, Aang's former Firebending master and genius was actually captured by this fifteen-year-old demon.

Iroh remembered Jeong Jeong, back in the day when he was just starting out with a low ranking. For a person so young, he truly had a lot of knowledge about Firebending. His genius helped him rise exponentially through the ran,s and it was probably only matched by Iroh himself. He couldn't believe that someone so experienced was captured by his wicked niece.

Ty Lee reminded Azula, "But we would still be missing your brother!"

"Don't worry, he'll slip up soon enough, and we'll be there to get him!"

"You see Ty Lee, once a dum-dum, always a dum-dum."

Zuko, still facing the three elite bounty huntresses, gripped the handles of his swords, preparing himself for battle.

Shrugging her shoulders, Azula said, "Well why not, getting more praise has never done anybody harm, and I really like the idea of having my dum-dum brother's throne so let's get to work! Mai, you get your wish. Attack at will!"

As soon as she heard this, Mai shot of like lightning towards Zuko. As she drew closer, she shot three needles aimed at Zuko's pressure points to immobilize him, but the projectiles where quickly cast aside by Zuko's dual swords.

Mai closed in on him, pressuring him to take a few steps back. As he did, he had to flip in another direction, because Ty Lee was going for his back.

"Ty Lee, what are you doing? This is my fight!" screamed Mai.

"Azula thought that we had to be extra-sure that he didn't get away, so I'm here to help!" she answered back in a cheery voice.

"Ugh, fine, just don't get in my way!" she yelled back furious that her supposed friend didn't trust her enough with the task. She was so furious, in fact, that she didn't see him coming when the handles of the Blue Spirit's swords made impact with her stomach. She was thrust back a few feet.

For his part, Zuko felt kind of sorry for having to hit them. It wasn't actually their fault; they just had really bad luck of knowing Azula, who always tried to exploit them for their abilities.

Everyone in the gang watched closely how the battle was going. Everybody was at the edge of their seats, stunned that anyone could have lasted that long against those girls, and a non-bender at that! Probably the only people that weren't excited were Sokka and Iroh.

Sokka, because he was being sarcastic, saying that he could do that too if he felt like it…but on the inside, he admired the spirit. He thought that if they made it out alive he could ask that legendary warrior to show him a few moves to take back home to the South Pole when the war was over.

But Iroh, he knew the real truth of the battle. Nobody really had taken notice that Azula was still there watching, waiting for the perfect moment to strike behind his back. Plus, he saw that the Blue Spirit was reaching his limit. He had wasted too much energy trying to beat the soldiers, and now he had to face two of the elite warriors of the Girls' Military Academy of the Fire Nation at the same time.

And as predicted, the Spirit dodged Mai's projectiles aimed for his chest. Ty Lee came from the side and jabbed for his arm, but he quickly responded by using the broad side of the sword as a shield from the jab. But Mai surprised him, shooting arrows towards his boots and stapling him to the ground, while Ty Lee finished him off with a flying kick to his face. He was thrown backwards, landing five feet away from the girls. It was a powerful kick. Iroh turned his face away when the hit had fallen on the Spirit, as if the blow were so hard that he too had felt it.

The Blue Spirit was down and the two warriors were slowly making their way up to him. Katara had turned away when she saw him take the blow. She couldn't believe that her legendary savior had lost.

Iroh began to try heating the shackles over and over again, faster and faster, but nothing worked. "Get up Zuko, Get up!" he thought, as though the fallen prince would hear his words.

Even Aang was trying to give his support. "Get up Blue Spirit! You can do it!" but it was in vain.

"How pathetic!" said Azula to her teammates. "I guess they'll call any outlaw a legendary warrior these days!"

Mai's grin quickly faded from her face as the old, calm self took control again. "That was boring," she replied. "Well, what are you guys doing there, go tie him up before he gets up! And then, next stop: fame and glory!" scream Azula. She felt great; she was the leader of a successful bounty hunter team that had actually captured all of the enemies of the fire nation. Her father was going to be so pleased!

As Zuko lay there, terrible images passed through his mind. He visualized how they would take Katara, his uncle, and the others and hang them in front of the public, which would throw things at them, encouraging the executors to start ahead of schedule. He saw the disappointed faces of the gang as they stared into his mask, their hopes fading.

He focused on the eyes of Katara and his uncle. They gazes penetrated his soul, charging it full of guilt. He couldn't stand it. Then, the images abruptly disappeared like a mist, and a strange figure approached him. He couldn't make out who it was at first, but as he got closer, he immediately recognized the visitor.

"Lu Ten! How in the world are you here?" he asked the spirit. Lu Ten only looked at him with a grim expression on his face and answered him, "I take it that you didn't like what you saw!"

Zuko couldn't believe that his cousin was right there in front of him. "Zuko, remember the promise that you made me, when I left? I asked you to keep on training, so that you could realize your full potential as a bender, but you didn't, did you?"

Zuko couldn't speak, his eyes couldn't believe what he was seeing, but he shook off the disbelief from his head and, unable to look at the spirit in the eyes, he answered coldly, "No."

"Zuko, if you had done what I have told you, you wouldn't be in this predicament. If only you could control your power, maybe you would be able to spare them from the fate that has been paved for them."

Zuko quickly replied back to him, his voice sounded like it was breaking, "I tried, I really did, but I couldn't control it, it would trigger with every emotion I had!"

Lu Ten looked at him with an expressionless face, "So you thought that the best way to control it was to forget your emotions at all. But emotions, they are the soul of Firebending. Their influence is what makes fire alive, Zuko! But you've killed it! I bet that you can't even summon half of the great power that you used to have!"

The spirit had changed his expression from stern to sympathetic and continued. "Zuko, the real purpose I'm hear is because I came to tell you that you have a big role to play in this war and its outcome! The world is in great need of that power, and I respect the fact that you don't want to hurt anyone, but if you don't harness that power now, millions of lives will be lost, not just on the side of the Fire Nation, but across the world.

"Already one race had to suffer from this: the Airbenders. You have to summon that power, Zuko; if not, the Avatar will fail, and all will be lost!"

"But even if I wanted to use that power, I've repressed it for years! It's almost impossible for me to summon it now!"

"That is not true Zuko!" the spirit told him, "I've been watching you and you already started to awaken it again! You've probably felt it, too. There is a girl out there who has opened the gates to your emotions again. You now have the drive necessary for you to use your powers again!"

"But if I use them here, she… they will get hurt!" His cousin looked at him with an easier expression.

"Zuko, you won't have to worry about that! I believe in you, you can do this! Now, if you don't, unfortunately your friends will pay the price." Zuko was suddenly barraged by images of how Katara and her gang and his uncle were all executed, one by one.

He couldn't take it! He didn't want to lose anybody else; he had already lost too many people he cared about: his cousin, his mother. If something were to happen to the only people that he cared for now, he felt that he couldn't go on living. He focused on this idea, how he wanted to be strong enough to save them.

He heard sharp fizzling sounds. His fists were covered in a blue flame! He could feel the power surging through his veins, the strength that he had forgotten about for so long. His cousin smiled.

"I think you've got it Zuko. Now, go save your loved ones, like the real Blue Spirit!" and suddenly the image of his cousin faded from his mind's eye.

Snapping back to reality suddenly, he saw his two opponents only two feet away from him, preparing to tie him up. He grabbed his swords and jumped up, swirling them around him with a blue flame emerging from tip of the swords. He was creating a human–sized, fiery tornado. The two girls were blown away by the blast, all the way to were Azula was! They had scorch marks all over their clothes and some superficial burns on their hands and legs, but they were completely knocked senseless.

Everyone was shocked at the warrior's amazing comeback. The flaming tornado continued burning, scorching the grass beneath it and lighting the nearest brush around the Blue Spirit in flame.

"He's a Firebender!" shouted Sokka, "I can't believe we put our trust of survival on a Firebender," quickly looking at Iroh who was still mesmerized by the Spirit's abilities, and adding a casual, "no offense," to the phrase, but Iroh didn't even hear it.

Slowly, a wry grin spread across his face.

"So, this was the hidden power that my son mentioned to me! Azula is in for a world of hurt!" He had heard from his son that he believed that Zuko was some how special, even more special than Azula, as if he were truly blessed from the Spirit World, but he never believed any of it since when he trained him all he saw was a struggling bender, a bender that had to try billions of times to get something right just once. But with the blazing tornado just about seven meters away from him, he could see how wrong he was!

Aang was smiling actually from the demonstration of Zuko's strength. He was wondering if he had always had that strength, and why never used it against him. But in a way, he was thankful that Zuko never did, because he was sure to have received a world of suffering! He was really exited now: he couldn't believe that they had a chance. He saw similar expressions on his friends' faces, even a little hope showing on Sokka's. After meeting Jeong Jeong, it was easier accepting a Firebender's help; it showed them that not all Firebenders were bad. And by this one's power, it would be smart to be on his good side.

Katara felt the same way. She had already met him and saw that he was a kind, gentle person. It didn't matter what nation he was from, just as long as he was good and honest like he was with her…then, nothing else mattered.

The tornado's spin was coming to a stop, and Zuko stood firmly, observing Azula's frightened reaction. He dropped his swords, but his hands were still radiating blue fire.

"So you're a fire bender! Don't you have any shame for helping these traitors?" she yelled at him. "It doesn't matter anyway, though…it seems that I have to put you in your place! I challenge you to an Agni Kai right now! If you have any shred of honor left in you, you will accept the challenge!" She was hysterical; for the first time in her life, she was losing her grip on things.

Zuko, changing his voice a little, yelled out his conditions for the duel. "If I win, you will release the Avatar and his group!"

"Are you crazy?" she yelled back at him. "And if you lose?"

Zuko stared coldly to her behind his mask "If I lose, which I doubt, I will turn myself in freely to you!"

Everyone could only look on as the battlefield was slowly devoured by fire. They didn't know what to think: possibly the most important duel of their lives was about to begin.

"Then you do accept?" yelled back Azula clenching her fist as she prepared for battle.

"I do accept!" yelled back Zuko.

Azula grinned, "Are you forgetting the rules to an Agni Kai, Spirit? Or is it that you haven't had honor for so long?"

Zuko was trying to remember what rule could have he been forgetting, until it became clear what she meant: the mask. No protective gear could be used in an Agni Kai by either of the challengers, and masks were included. He was cornered.

If he took off the mask now, everyone would recognize him; Azula would probably spread the word to his father, he would become a "two-for-one" prize, and Katara would no longer accept him. She only liked the Blue Spirit, not him. But then, he remembered the words of his cousin, to not be ashamed of who he was or what he could do. It was a part of him that he had to learn to live with for the rest of his life, and if she could not accept that, then maybe their relationship was not meant to be.

Iroh and the others looked to see if the Spirit would agree to taking off the mask. Only Aang and Iroh knew the true consequences of that action: Zuko would never be able to rest. Two prizes would be on his head.

Katara looked somewhat anxiously to see the face of her hero. She couldn't deny that it was a low trick in getting him to reveal himself, but she was still curious as to his identity.

"If you have any shred of honor left in you, then fight me fairly!" Azula yelled across the battlefield. She was grinning madly at her psychological achievement.

Zuko turned to face where Katara was. He didn't know how she was going to react, but when he remembered the visions of her execution, he knew that he preferred her to be alive and hate him for the rest of his life, than to carry her death on his conscience.

He took another deep breath, yelling the battlefield, "I accept all of your terms!"

He slowly reached for his mask with his still-blazing left hand, slowly pulling it off. Hearts skipping a beat, everyone held their breath, waiting to see who the masked man was. Aang and Iroh turned their faces away from the battle. They knew that as soon as everyone knew, their trust in him go up in smoke.

**Well that's the end. Sorry for leaving you people in a cliffhanger after such a long chapter but that's how stuff goes sometimes. Well anyway I hoped you all enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed making it! Well I'm off to make chapter 5 and again I hope that I can count on more productive reviews. Peace I'm off to bed. **

**P.S: Don't forget to check my homepage for those who actually reviewed me since chapter 1. It's not much but I really wanted to thank all of you guys any way. **


	5. Another Zuko

**Well, I got nothing to say, so let's get this thing moving**

**Disclaimer: I don't own ATLA nor I never will.**

**Ch 5: Another Zuko**

With his blazing, fiery blue hand, Zuko reached up for his mask. Everyone's eyes were fixed on him now. He pulled it down slowly, dreadfully: he did not want it to happen this way. He had wanted to show who he really was on his terms, at a more appropriate time.

He violently threw the mask at the ground a few feet from Azula. Everyone immediately spotted red, deformed scar and his short, spiky hair. Azula wouldn't have guessed her opponent would turn out to be _him_, but, never one to show surprise, she softly passed her hand across her face and combed back a lock of hair that had fallen out of place, smiling wryly at him.

"I can't believe I didn't see this coming!" she laughed sarcastically. "Never in a million years did I think that **you** would be the Blue Spirit, Zu-Zu!"

Zuko didn't react when she called him by his most hated nickname; he was too mortified, looking at the rest, horror at his unveiling evident on their faces. Zuko could only imagine what the others were thinking.

Sokka's face grew pale, as he stuttered the words out: "We were going to be saved by **him**!I can't believe I actually started to like that Blue Spirit dude! Now all that's left for us is to just bet who gets to take us to the Fire Lord! Katara, I thought you said this guy was a good guy—he's evil incarnate!"

Katara didn't respond; her mind was too busy furiously reconciling the fact that her miraculous savior and her worst enemy were one and the same. She felt so naïve for having put so much trust into a complete stranger, and inside she was suffering the consequences. She felt sick, remembering the night that she had spent with him.

"It can't be him! He saved me…he took care of me, and was so nice to me!" But she couldn't embrace the idea that maybe Zuko had changed for the best. She began to hate herself, for actually having started to feel for something for him, for allowing him to get so close to her. She was just as hurt as she was confused. Seconds ago, she idolized him and had even grown feelings towards him; now, she just didn't know what to think.

"This keeps on getting better and better! I just can't wait to turn you over to Father… I wonder what he'll do when he hears about this: not only does his son betray the Fire Nation as one person, but as two! If there ever were a good enough excuse to kill you, this one is the winner by a long shot!"

Zuko only stood there, starring at Katara as she looked disappointedly at the ground. He turned to his uncle who looked him in the eyes and gave him a rough, reassuring nod, communicating that there was no shame in doing what he had done. Aang did the same.

Aang agreed that there was something wrong with this picture, though. Zuko was fighting against his sister…for them? But what would he gain from all of it? Aang knew as well as Zuko that should he try to turn him in, he would probably be locked up too as an outlaw. So where was the logic in what he was doing?

"Maybe Zuko accepted that he really was a good guy after all!" Aang thought. He could only hope for the best in thinking that true, because if it weren't then their plan for saving the world from the Fire Lord kaput!

Out of nowhere, Azula commenced the battle, delivering the first attack. It was her traditional, powerful lightning strikes.

Zuko jumped himself backwards, evading every shot that his sister delivered. He was faster now—a lot faster. Whatever power it was that surged through him not only increased the damage power of his Firebending, but also his fighting abilities. It was as if he were really a whole different person, or more like the Zuko that he wanted to hide from everyone… He had become the powerful Zuko that fought on the side of good, putting himself in danger for those he loved.

Zuko evaded strike after strike: he couldn't believe that he was fighting on the same level as his prodigious sister. Azula had noticed too, and was fast becoming furious. _She_ wouldn't let some spineless weakling get the best of her.

Azula thrust both her fists forward at the same time, releasing a giant flare of blue fire. Though the fire reached him in but an instant, with luck and a swish of his arm, Zuko was able to deflect the flame. But he discovered that Azula had intended for him to do that: before he could react, Zuko found his sister inches from his face, throwing a fiery punch at his stomach.

Zuko's head immediately dropped as he folded slightly from the pain. Azula delighted in her momentary victory, but her grin vanished as Zuko lifted his head and delivered a kick that breathed out fire, throwing her meters away from him. Azula made a rough landing just where her friends were lying unconscious, shocking them back to consciousness.

"What happened? Azula, what's going on?" Ty Lee asked worriedly. The observant Mai, however, spotted their foe opposite Azula.

Now, more Fire Nation witnesses had seen the unmasked Blue Spirit; this was going to be difficult. Zuko knew he couldn't just kill them, as it was against his nature… But then again, he couldn't just beg them for their silence, could he?

He waited to see if Azula would get up, hoping that he wouldn't have to continue their battle.

"Just this once, can't she call it quits?" he murmured, but his wish wasn't to be answered.

Azula flipped herself up, bringing a hand across her lips, wiping blood that had escaped her mouth away. Her rage was no longer masked by a smile.

She lunged at full speed towards her brother, shooting fire balls from her hands like machine guns. Confident after winning an edge over his sister, Zuko placed himself in his horse stance, opting to take the fireballs head on. Breathing deeply, he brought his hands together and thrust them towards Azula in unison, unleashing a fiery, blue drago.

The roaring of fire clashing with fire reverberated through the clearing. Zuko's dragon took the fireballs between its teeth as they struggled to get free. Azula began to struggle as she put more and more into the blast. She knew she couldn't keep it up forever, but she knew Zuko couldn't either.

But Zuko really felt no pressure at all: it was as if an infinite supply of firepower were coursing through his veins. The dragon feeding on his wealth of power, he knew now that Azula was beat.

Swallowing the fireball, the dragon engulfed the rest of Azula's barrage. For her part, though, Azula couldn't move: she was petrified from fear. She knew she had to run, but her legs wouldn't budge. At the last possible moment, she threw herself to the right, but the dragon still managed to bite a piece of her. The blast seared through her left shoulder. As her body cooked in the blaze, she cried in agony, wishing that it would stop.

"Azula!" her friends cried from the back, seeing their leader partially devoured by the fiery beast. Hearing his sister's screams, Zuko instinctively closed his hands and ended the fire dragon's feeding spree. Azula's entire shoulder was scorching hot, as carbon smelling fumes fizzled from her burnt body. She was completely broken. Her deformed shoulder had already begun transforming itself into a red scar, like Zuko's.

Azula couldn't believe what had happened. The image of how the dragon had broken through her fireball and begun eating her alive replayed over and over again, as if she were trying to decipher at which point in the duel she had made a mistake.

Zuko felt heavy. "I win."

Everyone couldn't believe their eyes at to what they had just witnessed. Swelling with pride, Iroh was overjoyed that his nephew was able to win the duel honorably. In that fight, Zuko had grown more than he had in done in _years_. He mastered new powers that he never knew he had, and finally pulled of incredible stunts worthy of a Fire Nation prince.

Awe-struck, Aang could only grin, thrilled that Zuko had won. Not only had he escaped Azula one more time, but he had been present at a real Fire duel between two powerful contenders. Once free, Aang wanted to ask Zuko to be his teacher right away, so that he could pull of stunts like that against the Fire Lord.

Curious about her condition, Zuko walked towards his fallen sister. But as he walked closer, Mai moved in front of Azula and extended her arms, silently communicating him that he wouldn't pass to hurt her friend. Ty Lee followed suit, defiantly flanking Mai with a glare towards Zuko.

Unexpectedly, they both dropped to the ground on their knees and Mai, without lifting her head, spoke out to Zuko, "Please Blue Spirit, please spare our friend and princess!"

"We haven't seen anything, nor do we know who you are, so please spare our friend!"

Zuko stared down at them with cool eyes. He couldn't believe how lucky Azula was for having such loyal friends… Friends that she would easily trade away for a chance to take the Fire Nation throne.

Azula was staggering, trying to lift herself from the ground. Her shoulder was bleeding, smoking still wafting from the wound. The blood made rivulets down her arms to the tips of her sharp fingernails, dripping tiny drops onto the ground.

"What are you doing Mai!" she shrieked. "Get up both of you, we can still take him!"

Mai, still not moving from her bowed position, desperately screamed, "No Azula, we can't!"

"We can't beat him, not like this! Azula, back down! Haven't you ever heard of living to fight for another day!" Ty Lee appealed. Though she wasn't the best friend they could ask for, both Mai and Ty Lee cared for Azula and her well-being.

Zuko slowly turned and walked to where the prisoners were. Walking away, he said, "Mai, Ty Lee, make sure my sister sees a doctor right away…unless she wants it to become a permanent scar."

When he reached where his uncle and the others were chained up, he knelt down first where his uncle was to free him. He waited for some remark from his uncle, any remark, even his old annoying proverbs…but all his uncle could do was look at him with a smile

"You've done well Zuko!" Grabbing the shackles with his fiery hand, Zuko melted them right off. Zuko wanted to believe what his uncle had said, but as he looked to the others that were still bonded, he couldn't be certain. Even though Aang was smiling, the reaction of the other members of the group (including the one he cared for) was muted.

He next moved on to release Aang from his shackles, who said a formal thank you to Zuko, but then went flying off to break the chains that held Appa down.

Next came Toph, who strangely enough was the only one who wasn't making any face at him, good or bad, looking as if an enemy helping them were an everyday occurrence.

Sokka tried to keep his calm as Zuko was walking closer to him. He stoically waited to be freed until Zuko extended his fiery blue hand on Sokka's shackles. The Water Tribe boy cried out when he saw how easily the metal melted off his wrists and jumped back, grabbing his boomerang, unsure as to what the dangerous Firebender would try next.

Finally, Katara's turn came. He made no expression on his face, and tried to avoid all eye contact. Zuko couldn't bear seeing her deceived and disappointed shaded blue eyes. For her part, Katara felt like she was frozen in place. But as soon as the shackles melted off, she quickly got up, running towards Aang and Appa.

Aang was already helping Toph up on the back of the bison, followed by Sokka. She was almost halfway to the bison when Azula, helped to her feet by her friends, pushed them aside to prepare to deal a final blow.

"No, I won't let it end this way! I would rather die than be a weak failure like you!" Azula cried venomously. Setting herself in stance, she began to wave her right arm around, sparks shooting out of the tip of her finger tips.

"If I cannot take them back alive," she shouted, "I won't let them leave this place at all!" Splitting the energy around her into positive and negative, she shot her arm out, releasing a deadly charge.

"Now, all of you die!" she screamed, dropping to the ground with exhaustion. As if in slow motion, Zuko could only watch as the fatal strike made its way closer to her target.

"Katara, look out!" the Avatar called out. Turning to see the strike coming towards her, Katara's eyes grew in fear, as she instinctive lifted her arms to protect herself.

Time seemed to freeze for Zuko. He could see the lighting strike move barely inch-by-inch as each second passed in his mind. His legs suddenly becoming unstuck, he dashed as fast as he could to save her, but as he ran the lighting bolt seemed to move faster and faster. Right then, the only thing he wanted in the world was to save her: he didn't care how, just that he needed to save her.

Just as he repeated those wishes in his mind, he felt a deep heartbeat in his chest. Strangely foreign, it started beating harder and more consecutively. He felt an unkown force taking over: he started to feel more of the same power he had when he fought Azula flow through him. His ankles released a burst of blue flames as he ran, propelling him so fast that it looked like he were actually flying very low to the ground. He stopped right in front of Katara, and swiftly allowed the lightning to enter his body through his fingertips, make a path down through his stomach, and shot it out through his opposite arm.

Eyes hidden as she recoiled from the impending attack, Katara hadn't seen Zuko dash to block the attack, and she wondered why she was still alive. Katara felt her stomach flip as she looked forwads towards the back of the Fire Prince, now facing forward and prepared in his regular fighting stance to see if his vile, dishonorable sister would try again. Aang couldn't believe what he just saw happen.

But before Azula could ready another assault, Ty Lee placed her on her shoulders as Mai released a smoke screen bomb, hiding their escape.

When he was sure that they were gone Zuko looked over his shoulder, gazing at the startled Katara.

"You're ok, aren't you, Katara?" he asked. She was still half-frozen with shock, but she managed to give a small nod. Even though she saw it with her two own eyes, she couldn't believe that this was the same Zuko.

The blue flames which radiated from his fists and legs fizzled away. He was still looking at her when he smiled, "I'm glad."

When he finally turned around to face her fully, Zuko felt a paralyzing exhaustion take over him. His body began to release a thick steam, making him look like a steamboat with too much pressure, as he finally gave up to the forces of gravity and fell down to the ground, passing out into a deep slumber.

Iroh ran quickly to aid his nephew, picking him up and placing him on his shoulders. Though an old man, he was still strong enough to carry Zuko's weight. He started to walk away from the rest of the gang when Aang hopped off Appa and ran up behind Iroh, calling his name.

"Wait! We owe your nephew our lives," panted Aang. "The least that we can do for you give you a lift to somewhere safe."

Iroh looked at him with an intrigued smile, answering back in a formal tone, "Your aid is much obliged, young Avatar." And so Iroh, carrying Zuko on his shoulder walked beside Aang, moving forwards to the large bison.

Sokka was completely confused.

"What are you doing?" Sokka screamed at Aang. "They're Fire Nation! They'll stab our backs the minute we give them a chance…plus, didn't you see what Zuko just did? He's a menace! He'll probably burst into flames like that again and go ballistic on us!"

"Sokka, these Firebenders just saved your neck from a public hanging, is that anyway to repay someone? I'm also dangerous, but that doesn't stop any of you guys to come along with me!"

Iroh had just finished loading up his nephew on top of the bison, laying him flat on its back and sitting beside his resting nephew. Toph lounged beside the old man. Even though she couldn't really see, she could sense something was wrong with Iroh. She knew from their meeting on the mountainside that Iroh had wanted to protect his nephew from harm, and realized he ust have been feeling useless.

"Don't worry, he's going to be ok," Toph said, looking at Iroh with a confident face. "Even though your nephew was our enemy and not too many good things can be said, one of the few is that he never gives up! He'll be in great health again real soon."

Toph's words comforted the retired Dragon of the West. He could only look down to see his nephew's face, still in disbelief in how selfless he had really become in such a short while. As Katara finally got on top of Appa, Iroh examined her for a minute, remembering how his nephew acted at the last minute to save her… And finally, as if he had been struck by lightning, he understood the cause of his nephe's amazing transformation.

Katara sat herself in a corner with her angry brother, as far away from Zuko as she could. She looked back at Aang who was on top of Appa's head, whipping softly the reins of the bison and yelling the magic words to make him move: "Appa, Yip-yip!"

They were soon high above the forest, making their way to a safer location to drop the Firebenders off. She wondered why, of all people, Aang would be the first to pardon Zuko. He knew that there was a chance that Zuko had not really changed, and that this was one of his schemes to catch Aang.

But then she thought again. What kind of a scheme would involve facing a huge number of Fire Nation soldiers, and later facing the most powerful Firebender with her elite team of bounty huntresses? There was nothing that he could actually get out of it. She looked back at where Zuko laid, flanked by his uncle and Toph. She listened as the two struck up a conversation about the fiery trouble that Zuko pulled off in his youth, so that she could better understand the Firebender, rather than just relying on the bad reputation he had earned while chasing them.

"Zuko wasn't the best of the best Firebenders, despite what one would imagine about him being a prince. Actually, he spent more time making cooked ducks turn into ashes at the dinner table than burning up his targets in training! I remember this one time when he actually set off Azula's hair on fire! Everyone thought that it was an accident since he really couldn't control himself, but something in his eyes told me that it was on purpose…"

Toph rolled around laughing when she heard that one. The idea of a mini-Azula with her hair on fire tickled her terribly. From the distant corner, Katara let a small giggle pass her lips.

When Iroh heard her, he called over to her saying, "Hello there, why are you sitting over there in the depressed, gloomy, and **waiting-for-the-evil-Fire-Nation-to-get-off side**?" He yelled that part out just for the fun of picking on Sokka. She giggled again at that remark, as her brother grumbled some not-so-nice words and turned to face away from them.

Katara walked over to where Toph and Iroh were having their conversation, making sure not to step on Zuko who was still resting from the almost impossible rescue mission. Katara didn't partake much in the conversation between the two, but she began to learn from his uncle's perspective who the real Zuko was.

He told them about the time when his late son, during the siege of Ba Sing Se, told him about his nephew's first Fire Festival. From the description, she learned that Zuko was a spirited, happy boy with a lot of good in his heart. She especially came to that conclusion when Iroh told the part where he saved that girl during the magic trick with the dragon. She remembered the same thing happening to her with Aang and couldn't believe the odds of that happening.

As she heard on more tales about the young man's past, she began to wonder if the Zuko that they had met was in fact a mask, and that when he would use the mask of the Blue Spirit, it was the only time he could truly be himself.

Everyone else fast asleep but Aang, still at the reins with Appa, Katara reflected on her memory of the last few days: from discovering Aang and Toph, all the way to when Zuko saved her for the third time, from the lighting strike. She looked at him with tender eyes as he slept peacefully. She was beginning to feel that the feelings that she had grown for the Blue Spirit, had transformed into feelings for the young prince.

With her cool hand, she caressed his red scar, slowly leaning down to give him a soft kiss on the lips for good night. She raised her head slowly away from his and laid herself against a side of the wooden deck on Appa's back, slowly closing her eyes and sleeping with a small smile on her face that didn't wear off till the next morning. As she slept, Iroh watched her from an eye that remained open.

"You're very lucky, Prince Zuko," he murmured as he slowly dozed off again.

**Sorry for the late update. I would have submitted this earlier but well, it was fates turn to call the shots for this one and decided that I should suffer with a short circuiting of my whole block, taking away my precious light and electricity. But anyway I hope the fic is better for all of you guys that are reading this. I tried to make sure this time that people wouldn't get confused with who is talking by shortening more the paragraphs. If you think they should be shorter or want to inform me of another mistake I'm doing please feel free to review. May the holy element of Light bless you all, illuminate your paths, and shine a big light bulb on your heads so that you can et good ideas for your fics. **


	6. Hidden Power's Secret

**Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA nor I never will unless two things happen:**

**1.- The CEOs are women and I pull off my sexy Hohenheim dance (which is just me stripping into my skivvies to the I'm too sexy song) **

**2.- Or I trade in my Light Golems fabricated in chibi form to act as personal slaves for them, and in their sleep my golems transform into evil giant robot-like golems and kill them, while making it away to steal the copyright!**

**Though one can only dream right. Oh well on with the thingamabob. **

**Ch 6: Hidden Power's Secret**

Zuko opened his eyes slowly, shaking away the sleep. When he was completely awake, he staggered to lift himself off the ground, and walked around, trying to find his uncle and the others. As he walked further, he saw a bright, shining light that blinded him, and again the voice of his late cousin echoed in his head.

"Well done, Zuko. You were finally able to dominate the full power that slept inside you. Now, we think that you are finally ready to know the truth behind your power!"

"We?" asked Zuko completely confused, trying to cover his eyes from the intense light. "Who do you mean by 'we?'"

"Zuko," echoed the voice, "There is someone I want you to meet, though you have already met him… in his present life, anyway. Zuko, this is Avatar Roku." Sure enough, after Lu Ten mentioned the Avatar's name, he appeared out of the nothingness that Zuko seemed to be caught in, standing six feet tall, white hair swishing in the soft air current that surrounded him.

"Prince Zuko, it is an honor to make your acquaintance," announced the Avatar as he bowed to Zuko. A little frozen at meeting the last Avatar, Zuko managed to bow a little lower than Roku did, demonstrating his total respect for the legendary bender.

"Prince Zuko, the intense power you carry is not your own. Allow me to explain… Seventeen years ago, I have foresaw the moment when Aang would have to challenge the Fire Lord on his own. And even though Aang brought himself into the Avatar State, he still failed to beat your father, and the cycle was broken!"

The Avatar took a deep sigh, as he came to the hardest part to elaborate. "This was because Aang, since he was frozen in that iceberg for one hundred years, only had the chance to learn all four elements in one year, when a fully matured Avatar must train at least five, in order to bring out the full potential from his bending. In order to prevent the world from losing the balance the Avatar brings, I had to send aid for the next Avatar as soon as possible. My idea was to send a spirit from the other side, and infuse him into a newborn child, so that when the child grew old enough and strong enough, he would be able to bear the powers of the spirit and help Aang defeat the Fire Lord.

"Unfortunately, Zuko, you were the perfect choice for a carrier of the spirit. You were born into the royalty of the Fire Nation, free from all sense of greed and hatred… the polar opposite of the Fire Lords that preceded you.

"These were the main characteristics needed in order for the child to grow along with the spirit and train his body to contain the immense power. Since you were born as royalty of the Fire Nation, we thought that the training required to contain the power would be guaranteed, but were we wrong. After your family betrayed you, you decided to betray yourself by allowing fear and hatred consume you, cutting off your connection with the spirit inside you…until now!

"But when the moment came to choose which Spirit was going to be infused into you, the Blue Spirit volunteered. He was an exact match for you. You were a son born of Fire, and the Blue Spirit volunteered himself, furious at how his beloved nation was brining itself ever closer to the brink of damnation!

"Apparently, you have been able to summon his powers again by clearing up your inner turmoil. That re-established your connection with the spirit. And even better, despite the fact that you did not train to use his powers optimally, by slowly adjusting, you were able to access the maximum power and use it in your duel!

"But unfortunately, your forced awakening of the power does have a price. Since you did not train enough to be able to bear its powers, you experienced a fatal drain in your health. If you summon the Spirit's powers again in your present state, you will not be able to contain them. His powers may end up burning you up from the inside out, or even worse: the power would explode out of your being and destroy everyone near you!"

Zuko was in shock after all that he had heard. He knew that he had to confess the truth about how he awakened the Spirit's power, so he walked up to him and said disappointedly, "The problem is that I can't really summon the power on my own. When I dueled Azula, it was a fluke…I didn't know what I was doing—it simply came out!"

Avatar Roku stared at him intrigued, trying to find a solution for that bump in their preordained plan. "Prince Zuko, please describe to me the emotions that you felt when you accidentally triggered the Blue Spirit's powers."

Zuko thought hard for a moment, his memory fuzzy. He spoke to the Avatar, trying to explain piece-by-piece all that he could remember. "When I saw Lu Ten show me those fatal images of how they were being executed…and then I saw **her**, Katara's execution, I just felt this great need to save her and all of them. At that moment, I didn't care what the cost was, just as long as I could do something to help her! And when Azula was going to strike back at them at the end of the duel, I thought about her. I could see the fear on her face, and I couldn't stand the fact that I couldn't possibly save her… But then, it was like something in me just snapped, and before I knew it, I was flying as fast as the wind and saved her! I was able to beat a lighting bolt and redirect it!"

The Avatar ran his fingers through his long, silver beard, as he directed yet another question to the exiled prince. "You must have really strong feelings for this girl, don't you now?"

Zuko looked down to his feet, his face and ears turning a bit red. He analyzed how much hell he went through for her, from facing Earthbenders, to taking out an army, to even attacking and beating his sister! He looked back up to meet the Avatar's eyes, and with a sober face, he responded, "Yes, I love her, although I doubt that she feels the same way about me after I deceived her.

"She must probably think probably think I'm scum right about now!" Zuko got depressed when he realized this, and as he paled and shifted his sights to the left, away from the dual gazes of the Avatar and his cousin.

"And, by any chance, is this girl a Waterbender?" asked the Avatar, his tone accented with intrigue. Zuko could not see where this was going to, but he saw no harm in answering the old Avatar his question.

"Actually, she is! Practically a master, and I say that from experience." He said with a bit of pride as he began to remember their little battle at the North Pole. But then Zuko frowned, confused. "She is from the Southern Water Tribe, but what does all of this have to do with the Blue Spirit's powers?"

The Avatar looked down at Zuko. "I guess I broke the mold when I chose you as the Spirit's vessel. Never would I have imagined that you two would turn out to be so alike! You were both exiled, both of you are very strong-willed, and you have the same tastes in women! If I didn't already know, I would have sworn that you were him reincarnated!"

Dazed and still feeling clueless, Zuko only stared. "So how do I manage to summon his powers?"

The Avatar looked at him and said deeply, "The Spirit's power is driven by the power of your emotions. Your strongest one so far was the need to protect that special someone. I think that the Spirit lends you his powers in those situations, because she reminds him of his own loved one!"

His fond smile fading away, the Avatar sobered as he focused in on the prince.

"Zuko, your mission has the fate of the world depending on it. You must stay with the Avatar, helping him train to become a Firebending master. You must also train yourself, so that you can endure the strain that will come from summoning the Spirit's powers during your future battle with the Fire Lord. If all goes successful, then the Spirit will be removed from you… You will be normal again, and you will be able to take your father's throne and end the military advancements. Due to the arrival of Sozin's Comet, you only have nine months to make sure that the Avatar has learned all of the four elements successfully."

Zuko bowed to the Avatar, telling him as he lowered his head, "I will not fail you!"

Zuko then bowed to his cousin before turning to march in the opposite direction.

"Zuko, one more thing," added Lu Ten, before Zuko left the strange realm he was in. "Maybe it would help to tell her why you didn't divulge when you first met. And don't forget to confess how you really feel about her. That will surely make her changed her mind about you!"

Zuko looked back fondly. He knew he was very lucky to have had someone as caring as Lu Ten in his life. Even after his death, he was still giving him advice like an older brother.

Zuko smiled and waved back, saying goodbye to his cousin and the Great Avatar Roku for their advice. He was drawn towards the opposite direction from where they were standing, until a flashing light again blinded him, as he began to make his way back to the realm of the living.

**Well this has to be the shortest chapter I've ever written and I feel disappointed in myself for not giving you people more. The thing is that have you ever had that experience where you got some good ideas, but their for the very end of the fic, and you got squat for the middle parts, that are fatally enough the most vital? Well I'm going through that phase right now, probably due to that damn black out that's still going on in my neighborhood, taking away the light I need to light up my idea light bulb. **

**Well I'm going to rack my head against a brick wall until a hole opens in my skull and the light can finally shine in!**

**Keep on reviewing, they're the only things that keep me going, that and three daily Lts of coca cola running through my veins.**


	7. Opposites Finally Attract

**Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA and I never will. No more jokes or stupid rants coming after this so you can go ahead and read now**

**Ch 7: Opposites Finally Attract!**

After his vision of the two spirits, Zuko found himself under a tree in a green valley, waking up to the annoying beaming of the sun. He pushed himself upright and started to observe his environment. He spotted Appa sleeping on his back, and saw everyone's bags on the floor, abandoned by their owners.

The sun was already high in the sky, which was really odd for him since he usually always woke up with the rising of the sun. It was like a type of fire bender bio-alarm-clock-thing that he had. He then began to look around to see if anyone was with him.

As he rubbed his head from the sore pain he had in his back, he tried to piece together what had happened the day before, but all he could remember was the scene of the lighting strike his sister had formed to hit the Avatar. The image of Katara looking up at him half-frightened and half-frozen flashed in his mind, stirred worry inside of him.

In a panic, he jumped to his feet and started to search for her, turning in every direction to see if he could spot her. Running frantically through the wilderness, he stopped short, finally seeing her in the middle of a shallow river. Her clothes were neatly folded on the riverbed, while she was water bending in the white garments from the Earth Kingdom town. The where so tightly wound all around her that one was able to really appreciate the curves that the young woman had developed. As she practiced, her arms swayed in a graceful, rhythmic motion, and pretty soon the water began to form a blue, stream-like ribbon.

The prince sighed silently, relieved that no harm had come to her after the duel. As he watched her all his worries seemed to melt away, as she danced around with the water, it following her every gracious movement. With every circle the water made around her, it seemed as though the water was being attracted to her voluptuous body, coming closer and closer to her with every passing circle around her. Zuko could only envy that stream of water!

He kept observing her, his eyes becoming hazed as his mind was mesmerized by her exotic dance. Unthinkingly moving closer to her, a loud _crack_ sound was heard as his foot broke a twig in half. Startled by the sound, Katara's lightning-fast defense reflexes kicked in, and she made the stream of water circle her one more time with speed and launched it right towards the sound's origin.

As she looked carefully to what was it she had hit, she saw a knocked-down Zuko, flopping like a fish on the ground.

"Zuko! Are you ok?" she screamed all the way from the riverbed.

Mortified at having attacked her savior, Katara only stammered apologetically, "Zuko, I'm so sorry, I didn't know it was you!"

Zuko didn't look like he minded being hit by the powerful torrent. He finally turned around, sorry golden eyes meeting Katara's wide cerulean gems. He had a sad, puppyish expression on his face when he answered her conclusively, "I guess I deserved that huh? For deceiving you I mean!"

Katara couldn't break contact with his eyes. They were so golden and pure, but at the same time where full of sorrow and remorse.

Gran-Gran used to always say that a person's eyes revealed the truth about their soul. She had already forgiven him partly for what he pulled off as the Blue Spirit, but she was still interested in knowing why he saved her. Why did he risk himself against Earth benders, a small army, and his ruthless sister?

"Katara…" he started off a little bit unsure about what he was about to tell her. "I know you probably don't like me very much after having fooled you by being someone I wasn't, but I just wanted to tell you that I did it with good intentions at heart.

"At first, I did think of you only as my enemy, but… when I used to capture you as bait for Aang, I respected you for being so loyal to your friends. Then later, when we fought again at the North Pole, I admired your strength and courage as a fighter. Then, when I watched you, as you ran from those Earthbenders, something inside made me like you, and when we were in that room together, I felt something more! I couldn't describe it back then, as it felt so new, but at the same time I knew I wanted to keep that feeling with me always."

"After you left I went after my uncle because I was so reeled in by these feelings for you. They made me feel alive in a way. When I found out he was taken by Azula I knew that you would probably run into her as well, and I was scared that if you were caught I would never see you again. I couldn't bear the thought of losing you, only so that I could die again!"

She only looked at him back, seeing tears form in his eyes as he exposed his feelings for her. This was definitely not the same cold hearted, secluded and short-tempered Zuko she had hated. Instead, this Zuko actually opened up, showing that he really _was_ human.

Though he looked older and wiser than ever, he seemed to be more like that child that Iroh told about the night when Zuko beat his sister at the Agni Kai duel.

Katara was finally able to get the complete view of him for the first time, without her usual feelings of repulsion or spite against him for being a Firebender. As the Firebender kept on talking about how she really made him feel, she took tiny steps towards him, until she was only inches away from his chest, and she slowly wrapped her arms around him, surprising him with a kiss.

As her gentle, moist, rosy lips, met his rough, red ones, his eyes almost popped out of their sockets, but quickly settled into the sudden show of affection. But then, Katara pushed away. She felt as if she had no right to have cut him off like that while he was in the middle of spilling his feelings out to her. But when she broke off, Zuko wouldn't let go of her. He watched her and gently pulled her back to him.

He pulled her face, inches away from his and whispered to her softly, "Katara, I love you." His fiery breath tingling her lips, he crushed his mouth against hers passionately.

The first kiss was soft and playful, but this one was more passionate, more lustful. He wrapped his arms around her thin waist gently; she began to feel herself being pulled even closer to his chest, as though they were to somehow merge into one.

As he pressed her into his chest, their heartbeats seemed to synchronize, beating faster and faster together. Intoxicated and aroused even more by the sweet fragrance of her silky brown hair, he never wanted to let go of her.

Opposites have finally attracted. His fiery desire was quelled by the ongoing hold she had on his lips. Just as in the real world, Water was putting out Fire's flame, Katara satisfying Zuko's burning emotions. Hot breaths came as steam their mouths as they took tiny breaks to breathe.

Neither of them wanted that moment to end… until a familiar clearing of a throat buzzed through Zuko's and Katara's ears.

"Well, Prince Zuko, it seems as though you have recovered your fiery strengths!" sarcastically observed Iroh, chucking at his nephew.

At that moment the lip-lock broke, but Zuko was still left with his hands on Katara's thighs, a couple of inches nearly from grasping her rump, while she was with both her hands inside his shirt all over his back! And to make matters even worse, Iroh was being accompanied by Toph.

"Bu-sted!" yelled the Earthbender with a tone of playfulness. "Sokka's going to bust an artery when he hears about this!"

Now flushed with embarrassment rather than lust, the two jumped away from each other as if having been burned.

"Uncle, who do you think you are sneaking up on somebody like that, don't you have any respect for other people's privacy!" Zuko yelled at him, with a throbbing vein pulsing on of his forehead.

"Aww the wittle pwince is mad 'cuz we messed up the good part!" taunted Toph in a baby-ish tone.

"That's not funny Toph! I've never barged in on you like that when you were alone with Aang, now have I!" Katara snapped.

Toph's face went crimson red after that. _When did she find out about us,_ she thought furiously. _Darn you _twinkle toes_ you probably bragged to her about us, or worse, even that block head Sokka might know now!_

"Alright we won't say anything sheesh, why do you have to be such a _Sugar Queen_ about these things!" replied Toph, again arousing the anger of the new lovers. "Thinking about it, you guys make a good match together. Sugar Queen and Prince Hot Temper! Fire and Water!

"I have to hand it to you _Sugar Queen_, when you pick them; you go straight for the cream of the crop!"

Blushing, Zuko looked away from his uncle and the tiny Earthbender after hearing the bizarre compliment, shifting his gaze to the sun while he put his arms behind his head.

"Toph, just beat it! You're not making this any easier!" screamed a furious Katara. She was about to pound a world of hurt into her, but Zuko managed to hold her back while looking to his uncle for help.

"Toph, I think it would be wise for us to go back to the campsite. I'll prepare you my favorite blend of Jazmine tea!" coaxed his uncle kindly so that the girl would give up her teasing.

"Ok," the girl replied with a sigh of disappointment.

Pouting that her fun had to end so soon, Toph actually more than approved their relationship. Unlike everyone else, she didn't really meet Zuko until he was given the chance to save them and, from the tales that his uncle told them that night, he seemed to actually be a nice guy.

Toph was able to perceive not only the Prince's strong-willed determination, temper, and sternness, but alas his kindness. His personality seemed to meld perfectly with Katara's characteristic over-protectiveness, patience and understanding. It was almost a bit mystical: he was Yin she was Yang. He was a son of fire and she was a daughter of the ocean. Two halves of a single perfect whole.

As Toph walked along the old man, he smiled and looked back at them for an instant just as they were headed for the clearing, "My nephew is so lucky to have finally found someone that revives him in such a way."

"I think that the same thing goes for Katara."

After Zuko and Katara were finally left alone they looked at each other and saw their crimson red faces after the embarrassing moment they went through and suddenly they started laughing. Katara's laughter died a little sooner than Zuko's, but it was to better enjoy his recent change in personality. His laugh was refreshing to hear. He seemed like if he was finally acting his age, as a regular seventeen-year-old boy. She gazed at him as he laughed, but as soon as he noticed her, he stopped, clearing the mirthful tears from his eyes that he so long had bottled up inside.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing, I just like to hear you laugh, that's all; it's a whole lot better than when you used to shout orders at people." she said in a sincere loving tone. Zuko frowned as he remembered those times, when he acted out his rage to prove his father had been wrong in considering him weak.

Zuko looked back at her. "Should we go back to camp?"

"I guess so; it's already past noon, so Sokka should be back from hunting food."

As they started to make their way back to their campsite, he asked her something that had been troubling him for sometime.

"One question" he said to Katara.

"Only one?"

"Yeah, I was just wondering if you knew what happened to me after I passed out?" he asked, curious to know why was he still with them, when her brother would have probably tossed him from the bison if he had had the chance!

"Well, the thing is that Aang wanted to repay you for saving our lives by taking you and your uncle along with us to a safer location. When we finally got here, we found out that Aang's had planned to ask you on the journey to become his Firebending master, since you were so capable of beating Azula… But you were still asleep."

Zuko felt guilty again, when he heard her say that _he _had beaten Azula when it wasn't his power to begin with. "How long exactly was I asleep?"

She looked back at him smiling, "you were a regular sleeping beauty! You were asleep for three whole days! It was really funny too, because Sokka was trying to convince everyone that you had died and that the proper thing was to bury you twelve feet under ground. The extra six feet coming _just in case if he gets up and goes pyro-psycho again!_"

Zuko started chuckling at the image of her brother pleading with them to please bury him alive. "I'm glad that no one took his side!"

"Yeah, me too." He smiled when he heard that, it meant a lot to him know that she really cared.

"So," she went on, "in order to keep you around, Aang said that Iroh was going to be his temporary Firebending master until you wake up, so your uncle's wishes had to be respected since both of you were now Aang's new teachers."

Zuko pondered on the idea on just how it was that he was reeled in to be the Avatar's teacher, like the vision said he would.

"Something wrong?" she asked with a hint of worry in her voice, as she noticed his far-away look. Still lost in thought, Zuko didn't respond.

"Zuko, you ok?", she repeated, frowning as she placed her hand on his shoulder.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, don't worry, I'm fine!" he managed to blurt out the last minute, hoping that she didn't perceive his temporary absence of mind.

Zuko, I hate to tell you this, but you're a horrible liar, at least to me anyway."

He stared back at her. She was so right in that department. He was able to hide for so many years his true thoughts away from his crew members, his enemies, and even his uncle at times, but she could see right through him, as if he were made of glass.

Knowing that there was no point hiding it, especially after having gotten her to forgive him for deceiving her, he took a small breath and looked at her.

"Katara, this may sound crazy, but when I was asleep for those three days, I had a vision about how Aang has to defeat the Fire Lord."

He began to tell her of how he met with his late cousin and the great Avatar Roku himself, and about how Aang was going to fail if he fought alone since he needed at least five years of training. He told her about the spirit infused in him, minutes after his birth and how he was destined to help Aang defeat his own father so that nature's balance would not be disturbed.

"So that's how you beat Azula!", she cried, surprisingly happy at the knowledge that the fire wench never had a chance at winning against a real fire spirit.

"You're so lucky to have so much power… I wonder why I couldn't get infused with La's spirit?" she pouted her lower lip.

Zuko found it very funny when she did that. She looked adorable, like a small, disappointed child.

"But it's not all fun and games, unfortunately" he finally said. "There are some serious consequences when using _his_ powers!"

"What do you mean? You look alright."

"Since I did not allow my body to develop properly enough to be a efficient carrier of the Spirit, when I used his powers to the maximum for the first time in the duel, I took myself beyond the limit and I seriously reduced the amount of chi I had in my body and now I'm not able to summon his powers, if ever again."

"My cousin and Avatar Roku told me that I had to train with Aang in order to become strong enough to summon the Spirit's powers again when we fight against my father, that that's the only way we'll make it out alive."

"Katara, please understand that you can't tell anyone about how the Avatar Roku saw how Aang fails especially him. If he finds out then he will probably run off and then there won't be any stopping to the Fire Lord!

Katara was speechless at what the fire prince had revealed to her. Suddenly feeling exposed and vulnerable, she shivered, wondering how she could keep this to herself, with the knowledge that any moment it could all be over.

Zuko had noticed how her worry began to fill her azure eyes with tears.

Zuko took hold of her hand and gave it an assuring squeeze. He smiled at her and with all the confidence he could muster, he said, "But don't worry about it. If we _were_ going to die then why would the Avatar and my cousin waste our time telling me these things? I'll make sure Aang gets the training he needs and so will I and soon enough the war will be over!"

"Plus," he added, "if we do die, then at least we don't have to see the world turn into ruins and we would have an eternity to spend with each other!"

She giggled at the dark joke he made. Then there was silence for a while, until a curious thought had crossed Zuko's mind.

"Back earlier; when that little girl, Toph was it, yeah, you said she was with the Avatar… as in romantically involved?" he asked, very intrigued.

"Oh Aang and Toph being together, that's probably being going on for a month, maybe more!" she said with an air of _c'est la vie_ carrying her voice.

"Woah, I guess breaking taboos has really gotten popular! I mean Earth and Air? Now _that_ is surprising! So young and already trying to save the species!" he stated happily, his hand reaching out to grabbing hers as they dangled around her thighs.

She laughed at the strange image of Aang and Toph, still being together and being married and everything. She looked at her hand, her hand almost encased perfectly in his.

"Zuko," she asked with her face a lit with a pink streak across her face. "Zuko, do you think, we would be able to be together? I mean after the war and everything?"

"Why not? If everything goes according to the plan that Roku made and succeeds, then I'll succeed to Fire Lord, and stop the war. And then, surely for the treaties to work out, the other nations will need some kind of trust of the fire nation to see if they're serious of peace with the other kingdoms. They'll probably want to see a mixing of two nations. If we're lucky they'll have nothing against us being together, probably end up marrying us by force; and that's when the real fun will begin!" He leered at Katara, making it as obvious as possible for her to get his the idea.

In that instant, her eyes went wide open and she puffed her face out, a bit offended that he could be actually thinking of such things when they had just gotten involved with each other that same day.

She laughed and pushed him away in a playful manner and ran up ahead of him. He was glad she was happy; it made him really happy too.

"Catch me if you can!" she hollered back to him. He dropped his head down and swayed it like if he was shaking something off of his head and jolted it right back up, and he started to chase after her as she led him on to the campsite.

**Well I hope you like it. My ideas are back and going through a rigorous process of organization, but I really need input from all of you. Lately I noticed that the reviews have been going down and well I'm just hoping for the best that you're all just very busy lately. **

**Ch 8 will be up and I have to warn you that this story might just bright up a bit from here on after, maybe some interaction between Zuko and Sokka. Well any ways I'm off to start up the fic and please make sure to leave your reviews **


	8. Limitations

**Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA and I never will. **

**Ch 8: Limitations**

Back at the camp, Sokka had returned with food over half an hour ago, and was now making his best efforts to light a fire. Meanwhile, Toph and Iroh were 'assisting' him by sitting down to a cup of Jasmine tea and giving the water tribe warrior their moral support.

"Don't give up Sokka; you almost got it that time!" Toph encouraged him joyfully

"Don't give up? That's so easy for you to say! All you've been doing all day is taking walks around the woods and sipping tea with Iroh!

"Wait a minute, tea is a warm drink! But where did you guys get the fire?"

"Oh, like this," chuckled Iroh, taking hold of the clay tea kettle by the handle and holding it over his head. He then took a deep breath and exhaled a thick cloud of steam from his nostrils, heating the bottom of the kettle so it turned a bright red.

"Of course! You're a Firebender! Why, if you could do that, did you allow me to waste more than half an hour of my life rubbing two sticks together!" he cried, infuriated.

"It's just that you looked so dedicated to lighting that fire for us that I thought it would be a crying shame to stop and help you!"

Sokka went frantic after that, pulling the hair on the sides of his wolf's tail while grumbling not so very kind words about the Firebender accompanying him. But since he was really hungry and just wanted to eat as fast as possible, he took a deep breath and turned back to his fire and started to rub the sticks together again.

"Here, let me light you up," Sokka heard a familiar voice say behind him.

"Thank you, finally, someone that's willing to share the camp chores around he…" he broke off after he turned around only to see the person he had least expected to say that.

"Zuko, you're alive! What a nice surprise!" added Sokka faintly.

Zuko looked down at him wearing a cold look on his face. He lifted his right arm and pointed at him with his hand in the shape of a gun.

"It does feel good to be alive doesn't it? I mean the sky is so blue and clear and I'm most certainly not buried _twelve feet underground_!" he added the last part with a snarl.

Toph didn't know what was going on with him. She was preparing her stance while sitting down in order to trip Zuko, but Iroh elbowed her gently on her ribs, inconspicuously as possible pointing to a wiggling bush.

She closed her eyes, enhancing her sense of touch. It was Katara, and it seemed that she was covering her mouth, trying not to laugh! Iroh elbowed her again and signaled to her that everything was ok. After she better understood what was going on Toph giggle a little with the old man as he made the softest _shush _sound he could make.

"Zuko, I didn't say anything like that, I swear!"

"Toph, tell me, is he lying?" Zuko yelled, keeping his sight on Sokka.

Much to his chagrin and her amusement, the tiny Earthbender denounced Sokka's lies. "One hundred and ten percent false!"

"Toph, you traitor, how could you sell me out like this!" Sokka hollered.

"Say your prayers, water peasant!"

Zuko pulled the trigger on his made believe hand gun and a jet stream of flames came out of his index finger. Sokka ducked as fast as he could, knowing that he wouldn't escape his punishment.

Though after the shot, still curled up into a ball he looked behind him to see where the fire shot went off to, but he only found that the fire he left unattended was actually lit. Then, a burst of laughter made him jump from where he was kneeling to look at the wiggling bush.

Katara rolled out of it, trying to fight back the laughter, but was more than obviously losing the battle. Then, he heard a wild snort come from Iroh and a few giggles escaping from Toph's mouth.

He was so confused until he caught the look on Zuko's face. At first, it was relaxed, not as cold as before. Then his mouth started to blow up, his forehead sweating from the strain he was putting on his face to keep calm until the need to let it all out was too great.

"Hahaha, I can't believe you haha… actually fell for hahaha….it just like she said you would…hahaha!" blurted out Zuko madly. He was laughing so hard that he had to curl up into a ball putting his arms around his ribs, trying to cushion up the pain of laughing so hard.

"You think that was funny, Firebender? You almost gave me a heart attack!" he yelled while grabbing a tight, menacing grip on the prince's shirt.

"Sokka, let him go! It wasn't his idea, it was mine!" argued his sister who was still wiping the tears from her eyes.

She walked over to Zuko and placed her hand on his shoulder. "Now you _really_ are part of the family!"

Sokka was in shock seeing as how his sister was actually touching that good for nothing Firebender. "What do you mean he's part of the family, he's _Fire nation_!"

"Sure he is," continued Katara, "and he just played a prank on you, just like everyone else standing here did. I say that he's now an official member of our gang!"

"And what gives _you_ the right to make that call? He's not part of our gang, he's just a temporary aid to us, and then when we're done with the Fire Lord, we can all go back into being good, old enemies!" Sokka crossed his arms over his chest and straightened his shoulders, jutting his chin towards the Prince. "Plus, everyone here knows that _I'm_ the leader!"

Katara rolled her eyes. "_You're_ the leader! That's strange--I always thought that Aang was—although it's not like being Avatar is _important_ or anything…"

"Yeah sure, but everyone here knows that I'm the oldest!"

"Well, judging by the aching of my bones and my white hair, I'd beg to differ with that, War Chief Sokka!" chuckled Iroh while helping himself to more tea.

"Also, if you would actually try to get to know our new gang members, you would have learned that Zuko is actually one year older than you!"

"Well, they don't count, they're _Fire nation_!" Sokka's arms were now waving frantically. "They don't have a vote in the matter!"

"Well then, we're back to Aang being the leader, and he already accepted them both as Sifus, so I guess they _are _part of the gang now!" she said calmly with a hint of triumph in her voice.

Knowing he was beat, Sokka accepted defeat and went off into the woods, snarling and grumbling more hateful words towards the Fire nation.

"Don't mind him… he's a Neanderthal that's afraid of change, that's all."

"No, it's ok… I don't think it's wise to force him to do something that he doesn't want to. I mean, he can't stay angry forever. I know I couldn't."

She smiled at him, admiring his good will and patience, but the moment was cut short when a certain angry Avatar stormed right in screaming to his new sifu.

"Sifu Iroh, I can't stand it any more! I mean, I already learned the basics from Jeon Jeon about the breathing and stuff, but you got me there for almost two days straight doing nothing but breathing, and my legs are sore from that stupid stance!"

"You want to stop breathing!" Iroh and Zuko asked in unison.

"Why does everyone keep asking me that!"

"Oh, thank God, Zuko you're finally up, if anyone understands me about these things it has to be you. I'm already bored out of my wits here, please teach me something!"

Zuko stood there while the young Avatar was already clinging his both arms around Zuko's waist, looking up at him with a sad, wide-eyed, puppy face complete with tears barely hanging on his eyelids.

Unfazed, Zuko removed the Avatar's hands and turned to Iroh. "Uncle, tell me how has the Avatar been doing since you started training him?"

"Well, his stance is a little sloppy and his breathing is still too forced, but worst of all is that he still hasn't learned restraint!"

"Ok then Aang, you will be given a chance to prove yourself, if you can pass a simple test of restraint." He walked over to where Sokka had left the food. Sokka had collected fish from the river and, for later, enough apples for everybody.

He grabbed one of them and took a hold of Toph's hand, "Will you do me favor Toph, just stand right here, like this." He set the apple on top of her head and took a few steps back.

"Aang, if you can light the stem that's sticking out of the apple without hurting Toph, then you can move on to the basic sets!"

Aang couldn't believe what his new Sifu had just asked of him. This was supposedly the moment that he was waiting for, to prove himself ready, but the stakes were so high. Doubt was beginning to cloud his mind; he lowered his head and turned around walking in the direction he came from.

"I'm not ready. If anyone needs me, I'll be breathing over there."

"Wise decision, Aang; you passed your first test as a Firebender! To see and acknowledge your limitations is the first component needed in becoming a Firebending sifu. After practicing your breathing, come look for me in two hours, and then we'll start working on the basic sets."

"Wahoo!" The Airbender jumped and spun in his native element. "Thank you Zuko, um, I mean Sifu Zuko," he quickly added with a formal bow.

"Well put Zuko, you almost sound like a true master yourself!" his uncle added with a hearty laugh.

"Toph, wanna' come with? I could really use the company."

Toph stomped the ground, sending a wave to knock Aang over followed by a _humph _and she was soon gone from the campsite.

Katara and Zuko couldn't help but feel a bit guilty for having caused that while Aang was rubbing his back after the fall.

"What's gotten in to her?" he asked himself after getting up and making his way his training ground.

"Katara, can you take care of Toph, while I go accompany Aang while he trains?"

She quickly nodded and ran of into the direction where Toph went into to better explain the situation, while Zuko chased after Aang.

"Aang, wait up!" he yelled across the clearing.

Aang turned. "Zuko, you're going to accompany me?"

"Well of course I am, you're my student, and I have to personally make sure that you're not slacking off in the woods!"

"Great, maybe later you can show me how you made that blue fire after the two hours, right?"

"Yeah, right," he hesitated to answer. He couldn't believe that he was back to lying again, though he knew that he would have to get used to it if he really did want to save the world.

"Toph wait up!" Katara cried out of breathe from running all over the woods searching for the young earth bender.

Toph stopped walking and turned around to meet her friend. "What you want now, _Sugar Queen_?"

"You shouldn't have done that to Aang, he did nothing to deserve that."

"Oh really, since when is breaking someone's trust not wrong?"

She hesitated to answer the furious Earthbender. "The truth is that Aang… he never told anyone about the two of you. The truth is that I sort of saw you two together just before you guys got sick!"

"You _spied_ on us!" Toph stomped the ground, bringing a column of earth up beneath her feet so that her head was level with the Waterbender's.

Katara held up her hands defensively. "I didn't spy on you! I was sort of in the wrong place at the wrong time! Come on; let's go back, maybe Aang's still training with Zuko and you'll get the chance to apologize."

The temperamental Earthbender frowned. "Well, I guess I can let you off with a warning, but if more people find out then I'll break you limb from limb!"

"I don't even know what's your problem with people knowing, I mean if Sokka knew about you two, he'd make fun for a while, thinking that it's nice and all, but he'd leave you guys alone in the next hour, but if he ever knew about Zuko and me, he'd go berserk!"

"Well yeah, he's still hurt about the Fire nation killing your mom… that's not going to be something easy to forget, but if you ever find the courage to tell him, I bet he'd eventually accept it. I mean, he's your family and only wants what's best for you, and if that is being with _Prince Short Temper _then he'll accept him."

"When did you get to be so wise?"

Toph tapped her foot, making the land level again. "I guess hanging out with Uncle Iroh helps me get different perspective of things."

"Come on, there's still time to go check on Aang's training!"

Toph nodded as they both went running back to where the Avatar and Fire prince were training. Meanwhile….

Aang and Zuko practiced breathing in the traditional stance.

"Now, can you feel the sun beaming down on your skin, can you feel its heat, its energy?" asked Zuko with his eyes closed breathing in unison with Aang.

Zuko stood and grabbed Aang's arm, lifting him up. "Try to redirect the energy coming from the sun and to send it through your fist. Remember that the strength in Firebending comes from the breath and not the muscles, so try to make the motion of your punch flow as smoothly and quickly as possible. First, take a deep breathe and _gyah!"_ Zuko sent a fireball hurtling towards the sky. "Now you try."

Imitating his master, Aang took a deep breath and fiercely sent a fireball into the sky.

"I can't believe it, did I actually make that!"

As if officiating the Avatar into his new role, Zuko said, "Yes Aang, and a job well done, you can now create fire… use its awesome power wisely," as he gave a bow.

"Next lesson will be learning how to control the flow of fire, but for now class is now officially over since the sun is setting and I'm starving!"

Aang grinned and pumped his fist in the air. "Yeah, me too, lets go!"

As they made their way to the camp, Zuko couldn't help but feel relieved that the boy had forgotten about his promise, but he wondered how long he could hold up like this.

Meeting them a little ways out from camp, Katara and Toph were waiting, holding a stick with two raw fishes to give to the boys.

"Toph, I did it! I can make fire now, look!" He took the stick and gave it to Zuko, who understood and held it high in the air.

Aang moved back a few feet and began to control his breathing. When he finally felt that he was ready he snapped out his arm in a fierce punch that, surely enough, shot a fireball into the sky and cooked the fish medium-well in an instant.

"See!" he said proudly of his work, and went back to grab Toph's and his meal, taking it to her.

"Aang, we need to talk." Toph told him when she grabbed her fish. The two 'secret' lovers went to sit around the campfire, where Toph apologized for how she acted towards him.

Zuko and Katara began to amble towards camp. "I guess your talk with her went well."

"Yeah, and I can see that your training with Aang really bore fruits."

"I'm impressed…he's a really fast learner, but I only push him so much so that he'll learn the determination of a Firebending master and be strong enough to end this war."

"Did he ask you to give a demonstration of the Blue Spirit's power?"

"Yeah, but he forgot to ask me later since he was so hungry."

Katara's forehead wrinkled as she worriedly frowned. "But one day he'll find out, then what? How are you going to explain to him that Avatar Roku already knows that he alone will fail? How will everyone react when they find out the only chance of survival that Roku gave us to use against the Fire Lord was almost lost when you fought against your sister?"

Zuko looked Katara in the eyes. "Katara, you're the best Waterbender I've ever known and you're teaching Aang Waterbending. Aang himself is already and Airbending master and Toph's teaching him an Earthbending style that is incomparable! So by the time when everyone _does_ find out about the Blue Spirit's powers, Aang will have already mastered Firebending and be more than ready to save the world. And, if I train him well, then the Blue Spirit might just be more than willing to make a comeback!"

"I can't believe this! You should probably be the most worried one around here and yet you're perfectly calm! Since when are you so damn optimistic?"

"Since I found a better reason for living." He said adding a soft kiss on her forehead.

"Now come on, everyone's eating without us and I'm starving," he said handing her cooked fish.

Getting back to the camp proper, the two lovers found Iroh and Sokka eating together while playing Pai Sho. Aang and Toph sat together in a far corner on one of the logs finishing their meals while Toph tried to apologize to Aang.

"What kept you two? I was just teaching Sokka here the fine art of playing Pai Sho," he said, adding a chuckle.

"Yeah, where were you two anyways?" Sokka gave a curious, sidelong glance at the pair.

"Nothing, kept us, just that um…" Now it was Zuko's turn to play the fool, as he continued to stutter. He was out of lies for the day.

"He was helping me find my necklace, it dropped back there a minute ago, and since it was getting dark I asked Zuko to help me by giving me some light, him being a Firebender and all!" Katara rushed out.

Zuko really loved her then: she was always quick on her feet, and best of all Sokka was buying it.

"Is that true Firebender?"

"Sokka, how can you even question him like that? He saved your life!"

Sokka was going to say something, but he was quickly broken off by Zuko. "Yup, pretty much that was everything that happened!"

Sokka blinked. "Well, I'm glad that he's being a great help to you." And with that, Sokka returned his attention to the Pai Sho game, in which, sneakily enough, Iroh had switched a couple of pieces while Sokka's head turned to Zuko.

"Well young Sokka, I think that it's my turn now, and according to the rules of the game, I think you lose!"

"What, no! How much do I owe you now?"

"Well let's see, one, four, carry the seven…I'd say everything you got on your back!"

"What, some how my warrior instincts are telling me that you cheated!"

"Nonsense child, the difference between you and me is that I have the weight of experience on my side, and a whole lot to spare in fact!" he laughed at his joke while patting his stomach.

"But, I must admit that you are _seriously improving_! I bet that if you play me again you'll surely win!"

Falling for the former General's wiles once more, Sokka puffed out his chest. "Yeah, _I am_ getting good at this game aren't I, I mean last time you only made five moves, now you had to make ten!"

Iroh laughed heartily. "Yes, that's the spirit, one more game and off to bed!"

Of course Sokka didn't win a single game after that. Actually, he began losing faster and faster. He practically lost everything in his bag including his precious boomerang. It was either that or everything that he was wearing and, well, it was a pretty cold night so you can imagine what he did.

"That'll teach him to not be such a jerk to my nephew!" Iroh thought and went off to sleep keeping close to him his earnings.

Later that night however Zuko couldn't sleep. He gazed at the stars while playing Katara's words over and over in his head. His bravado crumbling in solitude, he reflected on how badly they did shake him up, but he couldn't show Katara his weakness. She would catch it, and then it would spread to everyone else and no one would be willing to fight.

He rolled over trying to push out those lingering words in his mind, but he couldn't. He got himself out of his sleeping bag and tip-toed his way to one of the logs and sat there staring into the dying campfire, now just a glowing pile of cinders. He placed some logs on top of the luminescent ashes and aimed like he did earlier to light the fire, but before he could pull the trigger the fire instantly came back to life.

"Couldn't sleep, Prince Zuko?" he recognized the voice and turned around to meet him, but by the time he turned, Iroh was already sitting right next to him.

"No, I couldn't," he answered gloomily.

"Maybe you want to tell me what happened between you and Miss Katara?" Iroh elbowed his nephew trying to rouse a smile, but Zuko didn't take much notice into it.

"Nothing happened, Uncle, you probably wouldn't understand. You're probably go into a tantrum if I tell you so it's best if I keep it to myself."

"Well, unless it's something like you got Miss Katara pregnant without marrying her, then you can shoot away."

Zuko took a deep breathe then told him the same story he told Katara, about his vision when he was asleep for three days. After he finished he waited for his Uncle to say to him some words of wisdom like he usually did, but Iroh didn't know any that had to do with the fate of the world.

Iroh's normally steadfast resolve wavered. "Why didn't you say something in the first place?"

"You promised me you weren't going to panic!"

"Of course, but that was until I knew that not even the past Avatar has faith in his own reincarnation to finish the job alone, and that the only weapon he gave us has almost been wasted on one insignificant demon spawn child!"

For once, the tables turned and Zuko found himself soothing the old man. "Ok, Uncle you need to calm down, do you want the others to find out? If the Avatar himself finds out and decides to run away, then who is going to fight my father and restore peace to this world…nobody, that's who!"

"Well, this is some fine pickle we've gotten ourselves into! So how's your Firebending?"

"That hasn't been a problem; I think the three day sleep I took helped me recharge my strengths for training again with the Avatar."

"Zuko, you may have already learned yourself that the Avatar is a fast learner, and pretty soon he will pass you, and then everyone will get suspicious to what happened to the power we saw when you beat Azula!"

"Then what are we going to do?"

"Weare going to resume your training. When the Avatar trains you will train with him, and when he is sleeping you'll be training even harder. Then you will be able to be an efficient vessel for the Spirit's power!"

"But doesn't that go against the first lesson of being a Firebender, to know your limitations and respect them?"

"Well really, with the training I have in mind, you won't go against your limitations, but broaden them if you will."

"So, when do we begin?"

Iroh stood up and began walking to the place where Aang and Zuko had trained during the day and looked back at his nephew appraisingly. "Now would be good."

**Hello Yellow Jell-O. So what did you guys think of that. Please give your most honest opinions in your reviews they really help out. **

**Well first off I would like to take the time to inform everyone that I am considering changing the formatting of the previous chapters so that people will get more breaks between lines and not get confused or lost or any of those things that just happen with Nile river long paragraphs. That's pretty much all I have to say about that so I'll leave you now to your writing of excellent reviews for this chappie. **

**I hope I was able to bend some light onto that matter and if you got the pun that I left for you guys in this rant here's a cookie and probably a chibi light golem with a glass of milk for ya! Well I'm off and keep up the good reviews!**


	9. Just for You

**Disclaimer: I do not have any property rights what so ever over Avatar The Last Airbender and I never will... unless….no that won't do. Wait I got it! The Ultimate Plan of ATLA Domination! But I'm not planning on sharing it unless you leave your reviews at the door. Thank you and on with the story. **

**Ch 9: Just for You**

Zuko followed his uncle all the way to the clearing in the woods.

"Zuko, our training will consist of making you expand the amount of energy your Sea of Chi can control. This exercise was especially made for Firebenders that had accidents with depleting their Sea. When your Sea of Chi runs nearly dry, it contracts and you are unable to wield the same amount of energy that you used to, weakening you considerably. But this exercise will prompt your Sea to grow, enabling you to have a larger store of Chi for the Spirit."

"Oh, and the best part is that your belly won't grow out like mine did, so you'll still be appealing to Miss Katara!" he added, clapping his hands against his stomach.

Zuko felt a little relieved by the joke: it meant that his uncle was also calming down about the situation at hand.

Iroh walked up to Zuko and placed himself in the basic horse stance for Firebending.

"Now, the exercise is very simple really, all you have to do is light a flame out of your hand and keep it at that same height, like so…" He began his demonstration sticking his right arm out and a ten-inch flame exploded out of his palm, then after he saw that Zuko understood he closed his hand, swallowing the flame.

"At first, you will feel extremely tired and possibly have pain in your stomach because your store of Chi is already low, but as time goes on with this exercise, you will notice that you can do it for longer amounts of time, meaning that your the Sea of Chi inside you has grown. Now, go ahead and give it try."

Zuko nodded and placed himself in his horse stance. Iroh shuffled out of the way, sitting on a short stump to better observe his nephew's technique. Zuko began by sticking out his right arm. He closed his eyes, meditating on his technique, as well as drawing air into his lungs. As soon as he felt ready, he mimicked his uncle and lit an identically tall tower of fire.

"Excellent," his uncle encouraged him while running his fingers down through his white beard. "Now try to keep it up for the next six hours. I reckon we have about nine till the sun comes up, so you'll be able to get plenty of rest before the others wake up!"

During the first two hours, Zuko didn't feel a thing. "This must be the lamest training exercise Uncle's ever come up with!" Zuko thought. But a little after the third hour had begun, Zuko started to feel a burning sensation in his abdomen, and he began to lose feeling in his arm, from his hand to his elbow.

The flame began to flare brighter, growing higher and higher, only to take a dramatic drop to almost an inch in height. Zuko was losing his control over the flame. He simply couldn't keep it steady anymore. The fire was beginning to take a life of its own, and, despite his struggling, he was failing to regain his mastery of the flame.

Frowning, his uncle took notice of his predicament. "Zuko, try to keep the flame steady, about ten inches at least."

Zuko was getting very tired and his head was sweating. He tried to win back control by taking in a reviving, deep breath and focusing on the fire that was flaring out of his hand. The fire slowly grew back to the desired height and Zuko exhaled a deep sigh of relief at being able to command his own element once again.

"Well done, Zuko. If you continue this training for the next two months then you'll be more than capable to use the Spirit's power."

"Two months?" he asked in disbelief.

"Of course, along with one more exercise I'm going to teach you right after this one!"

There was another one! Zuko was already faint and he was barely surviving the fourth hour. How was he going to make it alive to the sixth and still have energy to deal with another exercise? The goals that he had put in himself to achieve for the past Avatar and his cousin seemed to be traveling further from his reach…but he couldn't allow himself to be brought down so easily. The entire world, whether it knew it or not, was counting on his success in mastering his new training and then accessing the Blue Spirit's powers.

But the pain that was pulsing through his nerves was unbearable. The burning in his stomach made him want to drop and coil up into a ball to ease the pain and his whole arm was getting numb from the excessive bending. Even the palm of his hand was even getting carbon scorch marks all over it, a particularly odd injury for a Firebender, especially considering that the fire came from his own body. Zuko had to concentrate on something to push the pain out of his mind, but what?

"I know!" he thought. He began to concentrate on his breathing: that always helped him before, so why not now? He breathed deeply through his nostrils and exhaled slowly through his mouth. It was working out pretty well, until his concentration was broken by an obscene question that only his uncle could think to ask.

"So nephew, how are things coming along with Miss Katara, anyway?"

"It's coming along great, thanks" the beleaguered prince ground out, trying not to lose his concentration or the pace in his breathing.

"If that's so, then why didn't you sleep with her tonight?"

Zuko almost exploded right there when he heard the question, but he didn't lose his temper. He knew what his dear uncle was up to, and he was going to prove to him that he would emerge victorious.

"You know that we've been together for only one day and you already start pushing me towards those things? I never knew you were one of those perverted types!"

"Touché, Prince Zuko, but that's not what I meant. What I _meant_ was, why didn't you pass the night close to her? I mean you do care for he, so what harm will being near her when she sleeps cause, it's practically the same thing during the day, just that in the night you don't get to appreciate it much."

Zuko felt that the burning pressure inside his stomach was receding as he talked to his uncle. It made him switch his concentration to other things.

Zuko frowned. "You know that no one knows about it except you and that Earthbending master that you've become so fond of. Aang would probably not take it very hard since he's an open-minded person, but it's the other one that I worry most about."

"I never thought that the mighty Prince Zuko would be so afraid from the opinions of one Water Tribe peasant, and one that isn't all too bright, if I might add!"

"I don't fear his opinion about me…what I do not want to do is to put Katara in a difficult situation where she would have to pick between me and her only brother."

Zuko panted to catch his breath after that answer, as he was really tired and the burning in his stomach had returned full force. He felt as if he were going to burst into flames any minute. His uncle looked at the sky and raised his hand to his nephew, signaling that the exercise was over.

"Well done Zuko, the six hours have passed. Now lie down and take a five-minute break. Then we'll get on with the next exercise."

Zuko dropped dead from exhaustion and rolled himself onto his back, staring at the sky. It was still dark, and the stars had never looked as close to him as they did now. He tried to reach up, as if to grasp one of them, but his arm was tired.

He looked to the right to examine his arm. He started to pull his fingers into his palm, attempting to make a fist, but it was useless: his hand was wide open with that flame for so long that his muscles now resisted his commands. He kept on opening and closing his hand, to regain feeling in it before his uncle would start the next exercise.

Iroh continued watching him from the stump where he rested. He couldn't help but feel heavyhearted since his beloved nephew, the one he came to love as his own, had to carry such a heavy burden on his shoulders. But he likewise felt a sense of pride overpowering him, for his nephew already was, despite what the spirits said, a very strong person.

He watched as his nephew's heavy breathing slowed to recover its normal rhythm. He got off the stump and went toward his nephew, giving him a slight nudge on his shoulder with his foot until he regained consciousness.

"Prince Zuko, this is no time for taking naps. Now get up, I still have to teach you that last exercise remember?"

Zuko rolled over and noticed that his uncle had already started to move on without him. Worried that he would be left behind, he used all that was left of his strength to push himself off the ground. He immediately pulled his arm up from the rush of pain that shot to his brain and ended up collapsing on his side, cradling it.

Lying on the ground, he gazed at the stars for revitalizing inspiration. Soon enough, he rolled himself backward and used the impulse like a pendulum to get up to his feet. His steps were wobbly at first, but he soon got his balance, making his way to the next clearing where his uncle was waiting for him.

His uncle saw him wobbling his way up to him like an injured duck walking on dry land. He wanted so badly to help him, but unfortunately, if they needed the training to be successful, then Zuko would have to learn how to do this by himself.

"Prince Zuko, now the second exercise will begin. This one is a little more advanced than the others because it involves the absorption of other chi to strengthen your own therefore, thereby expanding your Sea of Chi by the same amount."

"Fire, as you know, is the only element that has a life of its own. Most elements have their benders use their Chi to manipulate their element. But Firebenders must create and manipulate their own power."

Zuko consciously nodded to confirm that he understood so far. The burning from his stomach had stopped, and he could now stand up straight. It was his right arm that worried him, but he made sure to not pay attention to it so that his uncle wouldn't go easy on him.

"Fire is produced from the direct combination of your chi and heat energy from the Sun. Therefore, I am going to show you how to decompose fire back into heat and Chi and how that once broken apart, you can absorb the Chi in order to expand even more your Sea and how much it can take in! The longer you can keep the Chi in, the stronger you will become, and more power will you be able to wield!"

"Now Zuko, since that has been explained, I want you to strike me with your best shot!"

Zuko couldn't believe the request uncle was making him, but then he remembered that he was the great _Dragon of the West_, and for Firebending at least, he knew what he was doing.

Zuko waited for his uncle to prepare himself in his usual fighting stance.

"Zuko, I want you to pay close attention to the movement that I'm about to make, alright?"

"Yes, Uncle," he answered hesitantly He still couldn't believe what he was going to do, but he trusted in his uncle's skills as a Master Firebender. Zuko prepared himself in his stance as best he could, his arm still hanging loosely from his shoulder. Zuko took careful aim and unleashed a fiery projectile straight at his uncle.

He meticulously observed his uncle, waiting for the retired _Dragon's_ move. His uncle placed both his hands out, like he was going to receive a pass from a toy ball, but instead caught the flaming comet that Zuko made. The miniature comet was fighting against Iroh, impatient to make impact against his chest, but then Iroh clenched on to the fireball and split his hands away from each other, the fireball mysteriously disappearing.

Zuko stared at his uncle in awe, unsure of what just happened, still waiting to see how he would unleash the chi from his body again, and soon enough, a fiery blaze was shot to the sky. Iroh kept watChing as the flare slowly faded away into the darkness. After the quickly dissipating fire could no longer be seen he set his sights on his nephew.

"Did you see what I did? All you have to do is concentrate your Chi to your arms and feel the power in the flame. Allow your energy to guide the Chi to your Sea and then contain it there for as long as you can. Simple, isn't it!" he added with a chuckle.

Zuko only nodded and put himself in his stance to receive a fireball. "Uncle, I'm ready!"

"You think that I'm actually going to attack you? You're out of your mind!" He signaled out the old stump he was sitting on. He raised himself off from it and lit it on fire. "Here, start with this."

"Try to hold in as much Chi from this fire as you can. I think that by the time you can absorb and hold it for an hour you'll be good and set by the end of the two months! So start practicing, you only have three hours before the Avatar wakes up, and he'll start searching for you to train him more!" his uncle said with a smirk all over his face. You wouldn't know it from the 'kind and harmless old man' demeanor he usually employed, but sometimes, he could be a sadist beyond belief!

Zuko moved forward to the stump. He placed his arms out, feeling the heat radiating from the glowing sparks that jumped as the stump burned. He closed his eyes and visualized his Chi being sent to the palms of his hand, bending the fire from the stump into his hands. The fire from the stump began to go down as a fireball in Zuko's hand began to grow, eventually trapping all the fire between Zuko's hands.

He began to feel for the Chi in the fire and started to split his hands like his uncle did, pulling the flame in. He felt the rush of the Chi burning through the veins in his arms until it reached the pit of his stomach. When it was all encased inside him, he concentrated in keeping the Chi in. This exercise wasn't as bad as the first one. He didn't have to use his own Chi as much anyways, offering a chance for him to recharge. His uncle examined him, counting each second that passed by to see how long his nephew could last.

"Five minutes, and still going! He certainly does improve quickly!" his uncle thought. How could he be so eager to help the world, when most of it had only hated him and rejected him for who and what he was!

"I'm glad you met that young lady, she really has changed you for the better!" he said, while combing the fine silver hairs on his beard with his fingers.

"Before, you used to try only for yourself, which used to bear little or no fruits at all, but now that she's around you, you seem more motivated. The world practically has been placed on your shoulders and you don't give a second thought about it, you just rise up to the challenge!"

"I've been entrusted with the world's fate by one of the greatest Avatars ever known, an earlier Firebending master, and by your son, who I love like a brother! And besides, if the world did come to an end, then that would mean that Katara would die too, and a world without her is one not worth living in. I won't go back to that life, not if I have a say in the matter!"

Zuko felt a disturbance in his body signaling for him to release the foreign energy out of him. He pointed his hands to the stump and released the extra energy as a fireball, lighting again the carbonized stump.

"Well, with results like these you may get your wish. At this rate you could finish the training within this month alone and be more than plenty of a master for the Avatar. You actually lasted for about half an hour on your first try!" His uncle turned around to make his way to camp to snooze for the remaining hours until sunlight came out, but he was stopped when hearing Zuko's question.

"Uncle, this training…I know that it helps me, but what if Aang asks for more advanced moves? What if he asks me to teach him something like lightning?"

He sounded worried, and had good reason too. Sure the exercises were great especially since the last one could be used as a defense against the Fire Lord for Aang, but later he would also need to learn offensive moves.

"Zuko, I have sensed in you that your inner turmoil has been swept away, perhaps never to trouble you again. If Aang does have to learn lightning, you will be more than ready to teach him. You were chosen by the past Avatar to be his teacher, were you not?"

"Yes, but…"

His uncle walked up to him and clapped his hands on both shoulders. He looked confidently into Zuko's worried gaze.

"Then you have to have a little bit of faith in yourself. You already have seven people believing in you, two of whom are all-knowing spirits now. So don't worry about if you are going to disappoint them or not. When you start doubting yourself, then will you have already been defeated without making a single step into the battlefield. Do you understand?"

"Yes Uncle, thank you." They both walked on back to the camp, luckily to catch an hour of rest of rest until dawn broke.

Finally close to the camp grounds, the two Firebenders tiptoed their way back inside their sleeping bags. Before closing his eyes Zuko wiggled his arm, which was still in bad shape. "Maybe some sleep would do it good," he thought as his mind plunged itself into pitch black.

It only felt as if three seconds had passed as he felt the warm rays of the sun on his face, telling him that it was time to wake up. He really wanted to just ignore the annoying biological alarm clock he had within him and sleep in, but unfortunately Agni just didn't want to give him his way.

"Rise and shine people, another beautiful day for training!" cried out Aang already dressed and excited to start his training.

The energetic boy hopped all the way to his exhausted Sifu and started nudging him to see that he was already awake. Zuko, of course, just wanted to _die_. Zuko tried to lie there and pretend to be dead, hoping that maybe Aang would go bother someone else, but the young Avatar wouldn't desist, so he rose up and turned his tired face to him, making a harsh _shush_ sound.

"Aang, I'll go teach you now if you do me two favors: one, please stop making so much noise, or do you want to make sure to tell everyone where we are so my father can personally track you down and kill you?" Zuko asked the young monk acidly.

Zuko observed how hurt Aang was when he scolded him and knew that he was being harsh on the boy; all he did was try to wake him up because he was desperate to learn, and had really done nothing to him. So Zuko calmed his tone and said sympathetically, "two, go warm up: today we're going to complete the basic sets, and maybe I'll show you a trick at the end of the day!"

With that the now-grinning young Avatar's enthusiasm grew tenfold as he turned to silently make his way to their usual training ground. Zuko watched how happy the boy was just to know that he was actually going to learn something. It reminded him a lot of him when he was learning the broad sword in secret with Lu Ten.

He got up, putting away his sleeping bag away on Appa's back. As he turned around to go meet up with Aang he stopped to see Katara sleeping. He was glad that he got the message across to Aang quickly enough to not wake up anymore people: if not, he wouldn't have had the chance to enjoy the peace in seeing her sleep. He tiptoed his way to her sleeping bag and sat on the log that was closest to her.

Her breathing was truly very soothing to him. He could just barely hear it, but it was the most soothing sound he had ever heard. She rolled over to his right, and Zuko was startled, afraid of being caught so close to her. When he calmed down, reassuring himself that no one was waking up, he noticed that three of her hairs were out of place. He tried to stretch out his right arm to put them back in their place, but the pain was still there and he couldn't move it much.

He used his left hand instead, as gently as he could, making sure not to disturb her divine slumber. She took a deep sigh and gently let it go as he made the slightest contact with her forehead. He looked at his useless arm and was inspired again to why he was putting himself through all of this.

This small moment was probably one of the most rewarding he had ever experienced, and though he couldn't share it freely like he wanted to, but it was rewarding to him nonetheless. He gently caressed her forehead, placing all the loose hairs back to their place and brought his face close to hers, whispering softly in her ear, "everything I do, is just for you."

Her body shivered from the tingling sensation in her ear, but she brushed it off as she slowly faded back to her sleep. With that, Zuko got off the log and ran all the way to the training ground, totally recharged with new energy and hope swirling inside him.

**Well that's it for now, still can't make it through to the good stuff. gets unbelieving stares there really is good stuff coming. I just can't tell you because well because then the surprise will be spoiled so bear with me until I get to the good stuff!**

**Also I have to sadly inform that after the next chapter I have to go back to school and study till September damn living in a country below the equator sucks! so I probably will be updating once per week. But I was thinking of doing something as a goodbye present so I can go out with a bang! **

**If this chapter gets up to ten reviews between now and Saturday then instead of updating one chapter for Sunday I'll do two of the original length that I always do! And this is good because the upcoming chapters are planned to reveal all and maybe another psycho duel involved as well. But this can only happen if ten reviews go to this chapter. And at least five have to be constructive. Also I believe that the formatting of chapters 2-6 should be done by the end of today, so if anyone would like to comment on how well the changes made were then you can go check that out too.**

**So please leave reviews at the door if you want to have two chapters to look forward to instead of one. Also leave them because they're all truly appreciated for the improvement of the story past, present or upcoming chapters!**


	10. Catching On

**Disclaimer: I currently do not possess the copyright of ATLA; therefore it's not mine, and nor will it ever be for that matter.**

**Ch 10: Catching On**

By the time Zuko got to the training ground, he found Aang practicing jumping through the sky, combining Airbending maneuvers with Firebending, but making sure not to burn anything with his wild flares. Zuko didn't want him to notice him just yet; he certainly did have to admit that the Avatar was a quick study. After getting a good show of the boy's learned skills, Zuko thought that it was a fine time to start the training session.

"Aang, I think you've warmed up enough, don't you agree?" he hollered as he watched his student hover, temporarily suspended in the air. "Unless, of course, you want to keep on fooling around and never learn the other things I have to teach you."

Aang immediately stopped from jumping around through the air and gently brought himself down to earth. "Great, let's get started now! So what're you gonna' teach me in the advanced sets?" he asked jumping around with great enthusiasm in his voice.

"Let me guess, lighting right? No, wait…maybe lava even? Or…blue fire like yours?"

Zuko couldn't help but think that the next classes for the advanced set were going to be hell. "Doesn't this kid ever get tired?" he moaned to himself. Zuko noticed that his pupil was still observing him, and jolted himself back to present matters.

"Aang, the basic steps were for you to channel your energy to create fire from your hands. Today however, we'll be working on how you create fire from your other extremities, all right?"

His pupil nodded and kept watching him ever so closely, making sure not to miss a single detail while rubbing his chin.

Zuko placed himself in a peculiar stance, very similar to the one Aang knew from his Earthbending lessons. Zuko placed his to feet together and closing his fists, putting the left one on top of the other, placing them at his right side, and turning to face his left. He turned his head towards his pupil to see if he was studying his stance, and when he was sure that Aang was paying attention, he thrust his arm out and kicked in unison, releasing a double fireball that he made sure would blow out by the time it would reach any trees.

"Now remember that the basic principle for this technique is to adjust your energy to be the same in both extremities. It can't be stronger in either of them…if it is, you will lose balance from your own combustion and be rendered helpless to defend yourself. Now that that's been said, give it a try."

Aang quickly put himself in the new stance that was taught him, trying to make sure that it was an exact copy of Zuko's.

Aang took a deep breathe just like he did in his former training lessons, and shot out his fist and kicked, but he put so much power in his fist that he launched himself against a tree.

Zuko didn't even flinch when Aang hit the tree; he just watched how his young pupil rolled to the ground and rubbed his neck, trying to numb out the pain from his accident.

"Get up and try it again."

Aang jumped back up, startled by Zuko's harsh voice and placed himself faster than the last time into the advanced stance. This time, though, Zuko walked up to him to study the flaws of the stance.

"Your fists, they shouldn't be too tight, but not too loose either. The key to Firebending is not in the muscles but in your breath. This is something you should have learned from the basic sets, Aang!" he lectured him sternly. "Your fists should be held at your waist line, not below it." Zuko then grabbed Aang's fists and forced them to be as loose as he needed them to be, while Aang, a little disturbed at his teacher's forcefulness, only watched him.

"Don't look at me! What, don't tell me, you think I'm pretty or something, right? Your enemy is that way, so look that way!" Zuko could go on forever complaining about Aang's stance. This was more like the Zuko he knew before. Strict and perfectionist, and though he did miss the somewhat transformed Zuko, since he seemed more fun to learn from, you had to admit, that the old personality did bring quick results.

When Zuko deemed his posture _acceptable_, he took two steps behind Aang to study him closely while he executed the technique. Thankfully, Zuko had good reflexes so when Aang _screwed up _again, he was able to catch him with his left arm before he hit the tree again. After he noticed that he was held by Zuko's arm, he immediately broke away and began throwing a fit criticizing himself.

"Why does it keep blowing up at me? I mean, I did the stance like you showed me and I still get it wrong!" Aang was really frustrated; he couldn't understand fire. There were so many tricks to fire that the other elements never troubled him with. He could be forceful with every element and let his instincts carry him, but fire required more control than he could imagine…and he hated the fact that he still didn't posses enough of it.

Zuko only watched as the young Avatar went rambling in circles at how bad he was and how stupid fire was because he couldn't get it, until he shouted at him from behind, stopping him in his tracks, the sudden holler sending shivers down his spine.

"Aang, first thing, never blame the element your trying to master, not earth, not air, not water and especially not fire. Only quitters and the weak make excuses for themselves. Second your stance was not off, but the balance of energy between your fist and foot _was_."

Aang then turned his complete attention toward his Sifu, hopping that he would give him a trick for this difficult technique.

"Aang, I think that this technique is a little difficult for you, so we'll start smaller. Let's focus on drawing fire from your feet shall we?" he placed himself in front of him and jerked his leg out and released a swirling flare of fire from the sole of his foot.

"Unlike the other elements, which are usually found in nature, fire has to be created from somewhere; the fire you create is the combination of the heat you receive from the Sun and your personal Chi. The better control of Chi you have, the stronger or weaker the flame can be depending on your choice, but there are some parts of the body where directing ones Chi is very difficult, or more precisely, the most difficult being the feet." He finished his explanation with a sage-like expression full of understanding on his face.

"Therefore, what I want you to do is shoot fifty flares from each foot with the same intensity each time, as best you can; I'll be watching you from under that tree over there, understood?"

The monk quickly got himself to work while his mentor went to rest under the tree. Zuko pulled the left sleeve from his green Earth Kingdom clothes to his elbow and started to inspect it. It had gotten really swollen from the impact Aang had on it. He kept opening and closing his fists, trying to get the muscles in his forearms to relax; he flinched a little at first but with opening of his fists, there came a small amount of relief. As he continued his treatment, he raised his head to watch the young Firebender in training.

Apparently, Aang was having trouble collecting the exact same amount of energy in his feet each time. There were times when he would have launched a long flare that wouldn't fizzle out unless he put his leg down as fast as possible, others that would be so strong that would break his balance and send him flying, and then there were others where only a small wick would come out. Zuko looked up at the sky, eyeing the sun, being well protected by the generous shade of the tree.

"It's noon already. We've been here since dawn, so basically six hours have passed and still nothing. If he goes on with this, his Firebending abilities will be at their max, and most probably end up blasting himself again," he thought

"Aang, take a break or you'll end up blowing yourself up, and then you won't be any good to anyone!" He didn't like having to go back to his strict attitude again, but it was the only way he knew of motivation for achieving perfection.

Aang listened to the instruction of his Sifu and sat down on the right side of the tree. Zuko looked at the depressed Avatar, wishing that his bending would have been miraculously as easy to learn like the others. Aang was new at failing and he wasn't taking it very well.

"Aang, don't trouble yourself if your not getting the advanced set right, right now. You just started learning about a week ago with my uncle and yesterday just started to learn with me and you're already in the advanced sets. It took me years to learn that much. After you can master bending fire with your feet, you'll find it very easy to do everything else. Like this…"

Aang turned around his head to better see what his master was up to. Zuko had his fist partially closed near his mouth. He took a few breathes and a giant cloud of fire came out of Zuko's mouth. "Like a dragon," Aang thought as he watched with awe the fun technique that was promised he would learn. His eagerness to learn was revived from watching that maneuver. Aang rested for a while, rubbing the back of his head that still throbbed from the earlier accident he had.

The silence between them was so thick that it could have probably been cut with one of Zuko's broad swords.

It was true that Aang had accepted Zuko into the gang, but besides from training, they never really had a normal conversation before, and that really felt weird to him. To see a person everyday and not say a single word to them or hear one from them was a thing that easily got to Aang, so he decided to break the ice with hope of starting up a conversation to better understand the banished prince.

"Um, Zuko?" he asked a little bit uncertain, trying not raising his voice too loud. He waited for an answer till Zuko stretched out his hand to signal him that he was listening.

"So, after the advanced sets, what comes next?" He thought of asking him, hoping that Zuko's jaw would relax enough to actually get to know each other better. Zuko sat up only to cross his arms and use them as a cushion for his head, coming down again to lie against the tree.

"I think that after the advanced sets, we start off with defensive maneuvers for two months, then finally, lightning. I don't know how to use lava, so don't ask me much about it, and I don't think my uncle knows how to use it either. After we're done with lightning, we'll focus on putting those skills in practice through some sparring, agreed?"

Aang liked the idea, if he could just get past the bump in the road of the advanced set, then he could learn all of the fun stuff Firebenders knew, and he also liked the idea of being able to spar with Zuko. Even though Zuko always fought with him before joining his gang, this sounded like fun to him because now there were no stakes involved.

Zuko could sense how happy the boy was, so excited and ready to learn new things. He liked that a lot about the Avatar, his care free spirit; mostly he envied it, not having one like his since he was born.

He remembered the countless terrors he had had to deal with everyday when he was a child living in the palace. Trying to survive Azula's pranks and save his sanity from her malicious lies. Trying so hard to gain his father's acceptance, even though he knew there was no place in his heart for him. He even doubted then if his father had a heart, but he quickly shook out those painful memories, and tried to keep track of the present.

He was now free like he wanted to be, and was surrounded by warm, loving people, who were actually beginning to respond to him. As he tried to take advantage of Aang's break to rest up from his last night's training, he took a deep breath and slowly, unwillingly closed his eyes and fell asleep.

Aang didn't mind the idea of sleeping, but he hated losing valuable time for training. But then he started to look at the bright side of this break. He was able to enjoy a beautiful afternoon, under a cool shady tree after training for almost half the day, and the sky was clear, without even a cloud in sight. Aang carelessly yawned as he watched the clear blue sky.

He continued to watch it, feeling the worries of his training slowly melt away like ice turns to water. He couldn't help but wonder if this was part of his training or if Zuko had noticed his bummed out attitude to actually propose a break, but he had to admit, having Zuko as a teacher was fun, like having another older brother, other than Sokka of course. But this one was the more mature, cool one that taught you all the stuff you wanted to know.

As he turned his sights to the pure blue sky, he quickly turned behind him for he had been startled after hearing a few rattling sounds coming from the bushes. He waited for the person to reveal himself and soon enough he heard a familiar cry, "hey guys!" followed by Katara pushing against a bush that had gotten caught in her blue coat

"Hey Katara, what'cha doin' here?" he responded with a slight wave from behind the tree.

"I thought I'd come to check up on your training. I'm still your Waterbending master, and my student's outcome is very important to me, so care to explain what kind of exercise _this_ is?" using a higher pitched voice to see if Zuko was still among the living.

"He's out cold, huh?" she said, giving up on the vain waving of her hand in the Firebender's face. "I can't believe this! He's actually sleeping, and I thought that Firebender's were supposedly sons of the superior element, didn't you, Aang?" she mocked sarcastically while looking towards Aang with a devilish smile. "Got my back?" she asked while the young Avatar silently nodded.

Katara gave him thumbs up, and she put herself right behind the tree Zuko was resting against. She coaxed a stream of water from her battle canteen and gently bended it into a ball right over Zuko's head. Aang started to giggle from the idea trying to restrain himself by muffling his mouth with his hand.

"Ready?" she whispered looking at Aang, who was lying down trying to look like he was asleep, but he gave her a thumb up, eyes still closed. She counted backwards, "3, 2, 1, 0…" _splash_! Zuko popped his eyes open looking around for the culprit.

"Aang, what's the big idea, why did you wet me?"

The young Avatar yawned like he was just waking up from a long nap, stretching out his arms as far as he could, looking back at his Sifu with a dazed look. "What happened?" he asked innocently.

"You got me all wet, cue ball, that's what happened!" He was very angry with Aang, but he looked around his surroundings and saw that no water was to be found and Aang was supposedly asleep right next to him, so the only logical explanation could be… but his thoughts were broken off when he felt the familiar touch of two cool soft hands blindfold him from behind the tree.

"So this is how you prepare for fighting against the Fire Lord, huh? Then it's safe to say we're all goners, right Aang?" she smiled sinisterly knowing that she had him pinned. Aang on the other hand was a little surprised from Katara's next reaction. He thought she would hit him or something, not act so fondly to him. Somehow the picture of those two together made Aang remember something he saw or had experienced, but couldn't put his finger on it.

"I only gave Aang a break because the Sun was already at its strongest and he kept blowing himself up, so that he could be given a chance to get psyched again about his training. And also because he's been training for about six hours," he added with a smile in his face. He kind of liked the predicament he was in. The cool touch of her hand over his eyes, especially over his scar soothed him more than the whole collection of tea his uncle had.

Aang felt like if he traveled to some parallel universe in that moment. He couldn't believe Zuko had gotten wet, and because it was Katara, he did absolutely nothing, and she started to play with him. It had finally hit him like a bag of bricks, he thought that what they were doing was familiar to him because he did live it, but when he was alone with Toph! So could this mean that Zuko liked Katara…and worse, that she liked him back?

Aang observed wide-eyed as Katara kept on teasing Zuko until she released him, giving him back his sight.

"I have to go back now and make sure that Sokka doesn't burn our lunch to a crisp, but the weird part is that I would have expected that from a _Firebender_!"

Zuko answered her with a sarcastic laugh and starred at her as she jogged her way back to the camp. Zuko didn't know it, but Aang was sure now of what was going on since Zuko wouldn't stop starring until he got his attention back with a loud clearing of his throat sound.

Zuko jumped back and saw the wise guy smile he had smudged all over his face, knowing that he was caught. Zuko wanted to explain what happened to the Avatar, but he just wouldn't take that annoying know-it-all smile off his face.

Aang was at first a little shocked from his ground-breaking discovery, but he was actually happy for them. He never saw Katara so happy as she was while being with him, and Zuko, well, it was the first time that he saw Zuko be relaxed and actually smile when someone played a practical joke on him, especially when taking into account his old self's short temper.

"So, since when has this been going on?" he asked coolly to his Sifu. Zuko looked to his pupil. He was nervous now; all he could think of was if he was going to go tell Sokka about them.

"Since one week ago, I think, why, you want to go tell her brother about it?" he added mockingly with bravado, as if telling Sokka wouldn't have any impact on their relationship, although it certainly would. He didn't want to force a fight between the siblings. One thing he liked about Katara was how she was such a good sister and friend to her companions, and he didn't want to be the one responsible for changing that.

Aang just held his palm out, telling him that he wouldn't tell another soul. "Actually, I think you guys suit each other…I mean, I never saw her have as much fun as when she's with you, and I don't think that your weird change in personality is a coincidence either!"

"Sort of like you and Toph huh, opposites matching and all? Who knew the idea could be so contagious?"

He shot a look back to Zuko surprised to know that he knew "How do you know that, about me and Toph, I mean?"

"Well actually it was Katara who found out like a few months ago, but she accidentally blurted it out to Toph when she caught us. It's actually pretty funny. All of us trying so hard not to let anybody know and yet it all comes down in a second!"

"Yeah, but does that mean that Sokka also knows? You do know how'd he react, right?" sounding a bit concerned for his tutor.

"Yeah, but so far he doesn't, and that's what's important for now, I guess"

"But he will find out eventually, and then what?" His pupil was worried about what his Sifu had gotten himself into, knowing that there could even be a division in the group because of this, and then they wouldn't have a chance against the Fire Lord.

Zuko stayed silent and stood up, walking towards the middle of the training field and answered his student coldly without looking back, "Aang, I think that's enough rest for now, come on there's still a lot of things to teach you before lightning and the sooner we get those things learned, the faster we'll be able to put those things into practice!"

Aang got the idea that he already knew all of the consequences and that he didn't want to talk about them, and decided to respect his wishes. He stood up and ran up to his Sifu to start his training once more.

"Now Aang, get into the new stance I showed you and try bending fire from your feet, another fifty times each leg, understood?" Zuko walked took a few steps back to give the Firebender in training some room, and from there he began to take note of both the strengths and flaws in Aang's bending, while still trying to shake out the words his pupil engraved in his mind.

"We'll just have to be more careful on what we do and where we do it," he planned out in his mind. And then he returned his thought to his student, trying to put all of his focus on the success of today's training.

When the training session was over and the sun was setting, Aang and Zuko went back together to meet up wit the rest. Everyone was sitting around the campfire, doing the usual.

Toph was hanging out with Iroh reminiscing about their glory days. How she used to be _The_ _Blind Bandit_ and won millions of underground tournaments, and he would talk back of how he used to be the feared _Dragon of the West_ and how with only one flick of his arm he could set on fire an entire division.

Sokka, on the other hand, was whistling a cheery tune as he sharpened his boomerang. He was finally able to win back from Iroh on a double or nothing game, and although he had a feeling that Iroh lost because he felt sorry for him, he was still happy for having his most beloved possession back in his arms.

Katara was just finishing feeding Appa and Momo, when she heard Aang holler to everyone that they were back from their training. Iroh and Toph turned around, leaving their conversation on a pause for a moment to answer them back.

"So Aang, tell us how your training went. Did you learn anything new today?" asked the retired general.

Aang ran towards them and sat down on the log beside Toph to tell him about what he learned today, from first screwing up the double shot technique, to how he finally managed to master that move and being able to perform others because of it, like blowing fire through his mouth and nostrils. He was about to show them by blowing some fire through his nose, but Toph said that that would be gross and she blocked his airways with two stones she had bended.

Aang couldn't hold the fire in and was forced to redirect the fire by releasing it through his mouth, coughing smoke out in the end since that move always left his throat parched, while removing the stones from his nose to get some air.

"I'm glad you always think on your toes _Twinkle Toes_…if not, you would have probably held up all that fire in your head and blew up." Everybody laughed at the idea of Aang's head suddenly exploding, and eventually even Aang himself joined in too.

Meanwhile Katara had already walked over to Zuko to hand over to him the dinner she had cooked. As she handed it to him she tried to take a quick grab of his hand, but he tugged it away, turning his look away from her.

"Not here," he whispered. "Too many people are finding out…it's best if we head out over there." He tilted his head pointing to his left into a denser part of the woods.

Katara nodded in understanding and yelled to Aang that she was going off to go find more wood for later in the night, and that Zuko was going with her to help find some since the sun was already setting.

Aang nodded, knowing what they were really going to do. He turned his look to Sokka, but he was too busy tending to his boomerang to even care. Before they went off to their made-up quest, however, Sokka managed to add a, "Come back soon and don't let anything happen to her, Firebender!"

Aang waited for them to be long gone until he could go ask Sokka a few questions to better understand how high the stakes were for both of them.

"Hey Sokka, watcha' doin?" he asked as he sat down beside him with a friendly grin on his face. He waited for a response from his friend, who apparently was too obsessed with his weapon to notice.

When he was done however, he placed the sacred object down and turned to the young Avatar, grinning back at him, "Ahh, now my boomerang's all nice, sharp and shiny, like it should be! What did you say, Aang?"

"I…the thing is, is that I have a friend who has a problem and I don't know what to tell him," he started uneasily. Sokka just looked at him with an interested expression on his face.

"So, this _friend_, is he anyone I know?" he asked while studying Aang's fidgeting with his hands.

"Well kinda, but that's not the point, it's just that he likes this girl and he's afraid her family will tare them away from each other and he just doesn't know what to do." He was feeling so stupid for asking the question so directly, but Sokka didn't say a word. He kept looking at him with his interested grin, then shifting his sights to where Toph was thinking that he solved the mystery to who was Aang's _friend_ and looking back again to Aang.

Nudging him with his elbow, he got closer to the young Avatar, pulling him downwards so that no one could here his advice. "Aang, why didn't you come to me sooner? Sure, we all know that Toph's family is a little too overprotective, but you're the Avatar, so if you get hooked up with her they'll actually praise you for it because you'll be like the ultimate bodyguard, and for free too!"

Sokka couldn't stop grinning, believing that he had hit the bulls-eye with Aang's question, but the expression on Aang's face was priceless. His eyes went wide from his disbelief at how wrong Sokka's interpretation was, and his jaw dropped so low that if could have almost touched the log they were sitting on.

Aang immediately pulled himself together and peevishly smiled back to his friend with his hand hanging behind the back of his head.

"Thanks a lot Sokka, you're a really smart guy, especially being able to see through my whole _friend_ disguise." He complimented his friend faintly as he stood up and decided to go into the denser parts of the woods for some alone time due to nature's call.

Sokka decided to take up his favorite thing in the whole wide world, and started to sharpen and polish it again when he noticed laughter coming through the woods towards the camp. It was his sister and the banished prince, back with more firewood as promised.

"Since when does my sister laugh so much, especially with a Firebender like him?" he thought. He didn't lift his head to see them, but only shifted his gaze to better observe them out of the corner of his eye. He noticed that ever since Zuko woke up, they have been close like they were in that moment, telling each other jokes and laughing together and…_stuff_.

"Could there be something going on here that I don't know about?" His eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Why would my sister enjoy the company of such a low life like him? No way that there could be something between them! Katara already knows that it was the Firebenders that killed our mom, so she'd never be able to like him that way!" he comforted himself with the idea, but then another detail surged in his mind.

"But what about _him_? Could he feel something for her? Nah, no way, Katara would have his head in a minute if he tried anything funny with her, so there's nothing to be worried about." With that final conclusion due to his trust in his sister's judgment, he continued to sharpen his boomerang till it was time for lights out.

As he wrapped himself inside his sleeping bag he made sure to see where Zuko would pass the night. To his delight, he saw that Zuko excluded himself from the rest of the gang members, putting his sleeping bag on the other side of the camp along with his uncle and with a small, gleeful smile, his consciousness faded away to slumber.

**Well people sorry it took me a while to update. And again I'm sorry but now I'll be going back to school this Monday, actually right now this morning so wish me luck as I go through the Legendary Nine Hells of School Life. Also ch 1-3 have been formatted and I'll probably keep formatting the rest ch 6 so if your bored you can check them and see if they're easier to read. I hope so because I don't really want thing to end and keep it as an on going project dedicated to search of perfection.**

**Grabs backpack and hurls it over back Damn I forgot how heavy these things are, but I guess when you're carrying everything inside of your locker I guess that's how they should weigh, well see ya all and I hope that all of you in the northern hemisphere are enjoying your summer break as how my short winter one sadly came to an end TT**


	11. Change part one

**Hello Yellow Jello, **

**Just when you think it's safe and your out, he pulls you back into this fanfic and tries to get you hooked again! **

**Well first off to set things right, I would like to apologize for my long ass absence, because ever since I started school again, everything went hectic! They got me writing a billion thesis' a day for my IB (International Baccalaureate) diploma and its eating me alive. Also got my higher level subjects to take again which make me get back home everyday around seven pm and I've been extra busy with Theory of Knowledge expositions about themes that are practically impossible to defend (the morality of killing someone, how can someone rape their wife and so on)**

**But I'm back and at full power and things are starting to slow down, so back I decided to pay the site a visit and let the world know that this light bender will not fade out silently, be forgotten and leave his project in hiatus. Just not who I am to leave things unfinished, so for the sake of responsibility and work ethic and since I missed doing this, writing for my own pleasure and not for the corrupt system of a damn diploma (even though it wickedly opens a lot of window opportunities) I'm here to present to you the long awaited chapter 11 and its part one, meaning that soon enough to make up for my absence will be part two being just as long as this one!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA nor I ever will period **

**Ch 11: Change part one**

Time went on. Days became weeks; weeks became months; and it all added up to seven long months of training for the Avatar and his Sifu. But it wasn't only Zuko and his student that grew: each of the gang's members changed in their own personal ways.

Aang learned through Zuko's tough training sessions the determination of a _true _Firebending master. Never settling for the mere _acceptable_ as his maximum, he would always strive for more…even if it went against his Sifu's recommendations. Aang learnt the techniques faster than anyone had anticipated, leading to the mastering of Fire ahead of schedule.

And today was the day that marked Aang's final training. They had two months before Sozin's comet would appear, and now it was time to put Aang's abilities to the final test.

"Aang, after seven months of training you and passing down to you each and every single drop of knowledge I know, the time to prove to me and the rest of the world that you are a Firebending master has come! I am truly astonished of what you have been able to achieve in these last few months and this makes me proud to be called your teacher! You are now a legit Firebender; use the most powerful element's strength wisely!"

"Woo-hoo!" Aang jumped into the air, straddling a swirling ball of wind and circling Zuko at a dizzying pace, until his mentor spoke again, distracting Aang and leading him to run into a tree.

_Ooofff!_

"As I was saying, you are now a legit Firebender… But before we celebrate, it's time to put those teachings into practice with the most fun part of the training plan." Zuko grinned brashly at his student. His student smiled back to him the same cocky smile, knowing exactly what he had in mind.

"What do you mean the past few months haven't been fun? I had a blast!"

"All full of ourselves I see, but let's see just how long you can keep up?"

Zuko shifted into his traditional fighting stance. His left hand was extended before him in the form of a blade, anticipating and deconstructing Aang's defenses mentally to prepare for his strikes. Preparing for a fierce Firebending battle, Aang shifted into a different stance: his had no defenses whatsoever.

Zuko's pupil only smiled at him, daring him to make the first move, but he knew better.

Aang was an Airbender, raised to see all possible angles and outcomes of any predicament. Employing Airbender wit and Firebending techniques could prove to be quite (and quickly) fatal. He took a step closer preparing to attack, but before he could begin to deliver his blow, Aang suddenly jetted himself toward Zuko, two fireballs lit in the palms of his hand.

Zuko was able to avoid both of the projectiles by dodging from one side to another, shortly coming face-to-face with his Firebending apprentice to begin hand-to-hand combat. Aang started using the double flare techniques that Zuko had shown him, time after time trying to break his Sifu's rock-solid stance. Zuko, however, had only to engulf those fireballs and break them into their two main components like his uncle trained him, sending them back to Aang with double the power.

But Aang effortlessly broke the stream of fire in two with his fists, only to find after the embers in his eyes were gone that Zuko had already come close enough to him to deliver his preferred techniques: kicks that burst with fire. Zuko found his attempts to shake the Avatar's balance to be failures, thanks to his student's extensive traning with Toph. Still, Zuko was able to land a few on Aang's weakly-defended sides, though he was careful not to hurt him too much.

"Aang, you have to show that you want to beat me. My father won't be as kind to you as I am: he'll find any moment of weakness and break you in that instant. Now take your act up a notch or we'll just have to go surrender ourselves because at this pace, all the training was for nothing and we're better off dead!" Zuko scowled to his student, trying to make stimulate his student's desire to achieve.

Reality finally smacked Aang in the face hard when he heard those words. The Fire Lord would be more than willing to kill him: he knew it better than anyone. Shoved out of his stance and a few feet away by the thus-far triumphant Zuko, Aang quickly scrambled to his feet and took a new stance. His fingers traveled through the air, small yellow sparks manifesting themselves on the tips of his fingers.

"That's much better," Zuko complimented as he too got into the same stance as Aang and copied his movements instantly, though from his fingertips jumped red sparks. They crossed and cut through the air many times each time making the lengths of the heat streaming from their fingers grow longer and longer, tension building in the air.

The battle's heavy atmosphere was finally cut when Aang released his yellow lighting towards Zuko, who counterattacked with his own blood red lightening. The two forces clashed, fighting each other. They danced and tangled each other, like two serpents trying to choke the other off, until they finally became one and an orange blast of light was seen followed by a quick growing cloud of dust and dirt.

"What's that?" cried the Water Tribe warrior over the loud explosion, his eyes shielded by his left hand.

The ground underneath the camp shook from the unexpected explosion. Appa groaned and stomped around while a panicky Momo jumped up and down on his back. Toph took her usual stance, trying to decipher the strong vibrations coming from the training ground where Aang was. She felt a soft clap on the shoulder. Katara stood beside her, starring at the cloud of dust that rose into the sky. She looked back, locking her eyes with Iroh who was smiling cheerfully at her while sipping his morning tea.

"Don't worry about it, child…that boom was the birth of success! He did it!"

Katara turned to behold the giant cloud once more, stunned at to how much commotion their _practice _caused. "If this is _practice,_ then what will the final battle be like!" she thought as the bright flash started to dim, and she slowly took down her hand from shielding her eyes.

Back in the battle, the two benders were too blinded by the light, but each did their best to not take their sights off the other. When the cloud dust finally dispersed and the light had completely died, the two sparring partners eyed each other warily with their challenging smiles.

"That'll do Aang, that'll do," was all that his Sifu could say as he stood normally. Aang took a low bow and thanked him, Zuko responding in kind.

As Aang and Zuko straightened from their bows, the two benders heard sharp echoing sounds. They were the sounds of claps: monotonous and weak at first, their strength grew and soon enough the figure of what seemed to be Iroh made his way to be the first to congratulate them.

"I've said this very few times in my life, but this moment really does deserve these words. Never have I seen the spirit of Agni burn so strongly in two benders such as yourselves, and I have to admit, I'm truly impressed with both of you! I'm sure that now you're both ready to take my accursed brother down!"

Aang couldn't help but turn to a light shade of crimson, but it quickly went away as soon as Toph ran up to Aang's face. She inspected him ever so closely; he could feel the warmth of her breathe as she came in really close to Aang's face, taking hold of his head gently turning it from side to side, as though trying to find that spark that made him different from those last few months.

Aang, even though he was used to being _manipulated _by her when they were alone, was surprised at her actions, even though they had "gone public" two months ago. It was obvious that Toph no longer felt embarrassed by being with him in front of everyone.

The day it all happened was still very clear in his mind. Aang smiled as he remembered…

_The young Avatar couldn't sleep that night. Something was bothering him, and he knew what it was, but didn't know how to confront it. Quietly getting out of his sleeping bag, he crept over the dormant corpses of his friends to make his way to his Earthbending Sifu's rock-tent. He silently airbended the flap of her tent open, and carefully popped his head inside. _

_Usually, she would be angry with him for barging in on unannounced, but since she had also failed to fall asleep, she let it slide. She stood to face him. "What do you want now, Twinkle Toes? It's really late." _

_He didn't say anything for a moment, only starring at her. She couldn't move a muscle; although she couldn't see his eyes, she felt as if something were pinning her to that spot._

"_I just wanted to talk, if you're not busy or anything like that" His voice had no tone whatsoever: it wasn't serious, but it wasn't lighthearted either. It was _too_ calm, even for someone who was a legit, pacifistic monk like him. She nodded slowly, bringing down the two flaps of her tent as she followed him to a river not far from camp._

"_So, what d'you wanna talk about, Twinkles?" Toph bended a pebble to shoot out of her hand and across the river._

_Watching the pebble skip on the water, Aang suddenly stopped it and bended it back into his hand. He played with the pebble, fidgeting around with it, examining it closely until he could find the words he wanted to say. _

"_Toph, have you noticed something weird about Katara and Zuko, like how they act and stuff?" He asked because he wasn't sure if she had found out yet._

"_Oh, you mean that Sugar Queen and Price Temper are together? Yeah, me and his uncle have known about that ever since the guy woke up from his fight with his psycho sister… When did you find out?"_

"_Not too long ago, and thank God that Sokka doesn't know! But that's not what I wanted to talk about. When I think about them, I kinda feel sad for them that they can't show it to the world because no one would understand or even accept the fact that they're _involved_, especially since he's from an enemy nation."_

_Restless, Toph played with the earth around her. Small rocks hovered and circled around her palm,as she feigned disinterest in what the young Avatar had to say. _

"_Um, where is it that you're going with this? I know that it's sad and all, but for your own good, I hope you didn't get me out of my tent just to state the obvious!" _

_Aang looked across the river. The smoothly flowing water resembled a black silk sheet since the clouds had taken over the skies, blocking the moon. He took a deep breath, steeled his face, and decided to take the plunge._

"_I'm a monk, and I don't like living a life of lies, even if they're small like this. What I mean is that they have a reason not to show it to the world… while we can but we don't!"_

_Wide-eyed and suddenly pale, Toph's concentration totally disappeared when the Avatar expressed his feelings so vehemently, the pebbles scattering across the ground at the edge of the river._

"_You mean… that you… want us… to go……public!" she stuttered out. _

"_Why shouldn't we? I mean, I like you and you like me, and no one would have a problem with that!"_

"_Aang, it's easy for you to open up to other people, but for me it's different. To show how I really feel isn't my thing." She found she couldn't explain any more to him. It wasn't that emotions themselves made her feel weak, but everyone knowing about them made her feel vulnerable. She was afraid that if their relationship were to become common knowledge, everyone would think that she had gone soft._

_Face falling, Aang's shoulders slumped as he turned to walk back to the camp, leaving the Earthbender behind. He felt so stupid. The person he liked considered him weak, and he only felt worse for having filled himself with hopes that he could change that._

_Toph, on the other hand, felt lower than the rocks she usually bended. Again, she couldn't move from where she was, feeling an immobilizing presence piercing her soul. Although she had never seen his eyes, or any physical characteristic of his, as a matter of fact, in her mind's eye she could see the emptiest and most dark pools of grey ever to exist._

_She felt ashamed and selfish. Her face twisted in disappointment and disgust as that thought crossed her mind: having been blind, she had always been proud that she could help others as much as they could help her, that she didn't take more than she could give. When she found the strength within herself, she stalked back to the camp, hoping that the Airbender would be in a better mood by the time she got there. Unfortunately, though, he was already back in his sleeping bag with Momo covering his bald head. _

_She didn't have the courage to go wake him up, so she surrendered, bending her tent up and sealing herself off from the outside world. As she laid still listening to the Earth, she couldn't shake off the empty grey eyes that bored through her mind, until she finally gave in to the exhaustion of her psychological battle and fell asleep._

_The next day was a complete surprise to Aang. As he sleepily opened his eyes, he saw a very familiar figure blocking the rays of the sun from his face._

"_Toph? Isn't it a little early to be up?" he asked groggily, still tucked into his sleeping bag._

_Toph stomped her feet, sending strong quakes that shoot everyone up into the air in their sleeping bags. As everyone dropped back and were rudely awakened by the forces of gravity, Toph could only smile while Aang slowly sat himself up._

"_What the hell is wrong with you Toph?" screamed out Katara accompanied by an angry stare courtesy of her older brother. Zuko ran as fast as he could back to the camp, thinking that it was under attack, only to find Iroh groaning on the floor like a helpless turtle unable to get up by himself._

_Toph's smile grew as she stomped the ground under her feet sending a rush of earth under Aang just strong enough to jolt him up to his feet. She placed her hands on her hips and hollered to everyone._

"_Everybody listen up! I'm only going to say this once! I like Aang and he likes me back, so if anybody has a problem with that, tough!"_

_Aang couldn't feel anymore embarrassed than he was in that moment, but it was a good embarrassed, because he was getting what he wanted, or so he thought… _

Aang's mind snapped back to reality from his reminiscence. The worst part of everything was that, even though he liked it being all out in the open, he the brunt of the others' stares when they were together, and the feeling of being spied when being with your girlfriend was definitely not a pleasant one. He felt her hands leave his face as she took a step back to take a better _look _at the whole of him.

"You've got the tricky brains of an Airbender, the serenity of a Waterbender, the aggressiveness of an Earthbender, and you've achieved the determination of a Firebender. It's official that you are the Avatar: well, a complete one, anyway!"

"It's true you know. You really _are_ the Avatar now," added Zuko as he walked up behind him.

"Aang, that was incredible! You've actually mastered Firebending now," wailed Katara as she made it up to them second-to-last followed by the grumbling Sokka.

"That's great and everything… but that means that we have to go beat up your father now, am I right?" the Water Tribe warrior (and mood-killer extraordinaire) stated matter-of-factly, starring at the Firebender. Sokka noticed it too, of course (he wasn't _completely _thick), but he knew that _someone_ had to be the voice of reason around here.

"Sokka, try to lighten up!" replied his sister "There are still two months left, and we can easily make the trip there in less than one, so what's the hurry? No one is going to attack us. No bounty hunter knows where we are, or have even gotten close to us for months, and Azula was totally fried after Zuko fought her."

"Yeah, but the fact is, that he never finished her off in the first place! If those two have _anything_ in common it's that they're really driven like crazy, and worst of all, she's vengeful. Aang, it's your battle, what should we do?

Aang thought for a while, scratching his imaginary, itchy beard. He was really tired from the constant training… But then again, people were dying every day, and the sooner the war could be stopped the better. He just wanted a few days off to recharge himself, but didn't want to disappoint his friends or toss aside his duties as the Avatar.

He found that there was no choice but to go and find a way to the Fire Nation to end the war, but before he could speak Zuko stepped in front of him and told the belligerent Water Tribe warrior his plan.

"Aang's been working on Firebending for a really long time now, and that's cost him a lot of work and energy. I think he should take a break for a month to review the other elements and to recharge. It's not a long way to the Fire Nation from here, and he's not going to be of any good to anyone if he goes to the Fire Lord already half dead!"

"That's very true nephew. Besides Sokka, you have also been training a lot for the upcoming battle, and you're also very tired so why not enjoy the present a little bit, and worry only when you really have to? Actually, that gives me an idea… Aang, Zuko, I think that to celebrate your achievement we should put on a Firebending show!"

"You mean like the ones they have in the Fire Festival?"

"Exactly like those, but how do you know about that?"

"Well you see, before I met Jeong Jeong, I snuck into the Fire Nation to get a personal view of Firebending. It was also during that time that I promised myself I would never Firebend, because it only hurt those around me." The Avatar turned his sight away from Iroh, a little bit ashamed of past events.

But Iroh placed a cheery clap on Aang's shoulder/ "You don't have to worry about that happening anymore… You're a master approved by me and my nephew. Plus, if we get into any trouble, I believe that we have a more-than-qualified healer amongst us," he said slyly as his head tilted towards the Waterbending master.

"It's ok, Aang. Iroh's right, _Miss Sugar Queen_ over there will have us covered, so go on and have fun with making a show for everyone… But it better be a good one!" Toph ended with a somewhat mirthful yet still menacing tone, the way she always talked to him when they _fooled around_.

Aang became ecstatic, running off with the two Firebenders to go make up a show for everyone for that night.

**Again I want to take the time to apologize for my long absence, but trying to get your ass graduated isn-t exactly a walk around the park so I guess I really can-t make many promises at this point, seeing that I feel that I-m boring you with them.**

**Anyway the second part will be up shortly, I got it written just need to take the time to beta read it and soon you'll be graced in reading the continuation of this fic and maybe even read the ending.**

**Other than that please review it would help to know that there are people out there who are still tuned to this fic even though I probably don't deserve it, as being the irresponsible author that I am --, but I NEVER leave things in hiatus so just bear with me, the plot will continue.**

**Again don't forget to review it be nice to hear what other people think about this rigfht about now.**

**Cheerios**


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